Green diary rescue & open thread

by Meteor Blades

At Climate Progress, Joe Romm writes:

We’ve known for a while that we are poisoning the oceans and that human emissions of carbon dioxide, left unchecked, would likely have devastating consequences.  A 2010 study found that oceans are acidifying 10 times faster today than 55 million years ago when a mass extinction of marine species occurred. And we’ve known those impacts might last a long, long time —a 2009 study concluded ocean dead zones "devoid of fish and seafood" are poised to expand and "remain for thousands of years." Worse, a Nature study just found that global warming is already the likely cause of a 40% decline in the ocean’s phytoplankton:  "Microscopic life crucial to the marine food chain is dying out. The consequences could be catastrophic." Carl Zimmer, a noted science writer and winner of the 2007 NAS Communication Award, reveals some more chilling facts about the path our oceans may be on in this repost from Yale’s Environment 360 online magazine. As warming intensifies, scientists warn, the oxygen content of oceans across the planet could be more and more diminished, with serious consequences for the future of fish and other sea life. ... In order to project how global warming will alter oxygen in the oceans, climate scientists are developing a new generation of computer models. The models are still too crude to capture some important features of the real world, such as the way winds can change how deep water rises in upwellings. But the models are good enough to replicate some of the changes in oxygen levels that have already been recorded. And they all predict that the oxygen in the world’s oceans will drop; depending on the model, the next century will see a drop of between 1 and 7 percent.

• • • • •

Green diary rescue appears Sundays and Thursdays in this time slot. Inclusion of a particular diary does not necessarily indicate my agreement with it. The rescue begins below and continues in the jump.

matching mole had a wonderful Wednesday, as recounted in 24 Hours of Wonder: Gulf Region Nature: "We had guests and we showed them a couple of the local natural wonders: St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge and Wakulla Springs and river - both just to the south of Tallahassee in the Florida panhandle. We had an unusually fantastic time and I thought I would share some of what we saw."

continued at Daily Kos....

Green diary rescue & open thread

by Meteor Blades

At Solve Climate, Stacy Feldman writes:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Energy (DOE) declared today that carbon capture and storage technology (CCS) is currently "viable," and that the only real obstacle to rapid deployment in the United States is political will. "There are no insurmountable technical, legal, institutional, or other barriers to the deployment of this technology," the agencies announced.   In a report of the Interagency Task Force on Carbon Capture and Storage that was delivered to President Obama on Thursday, EPA and DOE concluded that capturing and storing CO2 underground can play "an important role" in cutting global warming pollution by 2020, while "preserving the option of using coal." However, without a price on carbon, the agencies said they were highly pessimistic about CCS's possibilities. "Widespread cost-effective deployment of CCS will occur only if the technology is commercially available at economically competitive prices and supportive national policy frameworks, such as a cap on carbon pollution, are in place," EPA and DOE said.... The study's show of confidence comes at an inauspicious time for the struggling industry. The infamous FutureGen project in Mattoon, Ill., announced in 2003 and once expected to be the world's first CCS plant, was officially scrapped last week by the DOE after years of cost overruns. In its place, the agency said it would spend $1 billion to carry out "FutureGen 2.0," which would retrofit a shuttered coal plant rather than build a new one. But in a letter this week to Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the town of Mattoon said it would not provide land to store the CO2, causing an indefinite delay in the project.

Be sure to check out the Gulf Recovery series. So far 13 diarists have contributed to this blogathon organized by Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, noweasels and myself. More diaries will appear Friday. Links appear in the jump below.

• • • • •

Green diary rescue appears on Thursdays and Sundays. Inclusion of a particular diary does not necessarily indicate my agreement with it. The GDR begins here and continues in the jump.

• • • • •

Haole in Hawaii is one lucky fellow, as he let us know in Beautiful Birds of Botswana - A Photo Diary: "Aloha! I am back in the islands after my second once-in-a-lifetime trip to the Okavango and Linyanti wilderness of northwest Botswana. I have to say that re-entry into my work life and also into the blazing insanity that is American politics after two weeks of wildlife photography is jarring to say the least. This diary as all my diaries here is meant primarily as a respite from the craziness and as a reminder that we share this fragile planet with some incredible creatures." That is a Saddle-billed Stork (Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis) in the photo on the right.

continued at Daily Kos...

Green diary rescue & open thread

by Meteor Blades

In a study covering 2002-2008, the Environmental Law Institute concluded that federal energy subsidies favored fossil fuels over renewables by a wide margin. Moreover, more than half the renewable subsidies went to corn-based ethanol.

• The vast majority of federal subsidies for fossil fuels and renewable energy supported energy sources that emit high levels of greenhouse gases when used as fuel.

• The federal government provided substantially larger subsidies to fossil fuels than to renewables. Subsidies to fossil fuels—a mature, developed industry that has enjoyed government support for many years—totaled approximately $72 billion over the study period, representing a direct cost to taxpayers.

• Subsidies for renewable fuels, a relatively young and developing industry, totaled $29 billion over the same period.
 
• Subsidies to fossil fuels generally increased over the study period (though they decreased in 2008), while funding for renewables increased but saw a precipitous drop in 2006-07 (though they increased in 2008). The largest subsidies to fossil fuels were written into the U.S. Tax Code as permanent provisions. By comparison, many subsidies for renewables are time-limited initiatives implemented through energy bills, with expiration dates that limit their usefulness to the renewables industry.

• The vast majority of subsidy dollars to fossil fuels can be attributed to just a handful of tax breaks, such as the Foreign Tax Credit ($15.3 billion) and the Credit for Production of Nonconventional Fuels ($14.1 billion, though this credit has since been phased out). The largest of these, the Foreign Tax Credit, applies to the overseas production of oil through an obscure provision of the Tax Code, which allows energy companies to claim a tax credit for payments that would normally receive less-beneficial tax treatment.

   
• • • • •

^{Green diary rescue appears twice weekly in this time slot. Inclusion of a particular diary does not necessarily indicate my agreement with it. The rescue begins below and continues in the jump.}

• • • • •

Crashing Vor gave us a good warning in "Over": "BP's new well cap is in place and pressure tests have begun, with very appropriate caution. If the tests indicate that the well bore and casings have sufficient integrity to withstand the internal pressures of the well, there is a chance that the spigot may get turned off this week.As wonderful as that news is, it will bring a chorus of sighs from the media, the government, the oil industry and well-meaning Gulf Coast residents, a chorus singing, 'It's over!' That chorus will echo throughout the mediasphere. And it will be dead wrong."

In the EcoAdvocates series, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse offered some hope that Obama May Reverse Bush on Indigenous Rights: "Bush voted against UNDRIP (the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples) ostensibly because the declaration was subject to 'conflicting interpretations and debate about its application' and therefore not 'capable of implementation.' If this standard applied to the U.S. Constitution, it would not exist. In reality, Bush did not like that UNDRIP recognizes a range of rights that address corporate and governmental plundering of resources as well as abuse and discrimination. Elections have consequences.  President Obama recognizes that UNDRIP provides a framework for addressing the rights of indigenous peoples so he is now reviewing whether the U.S. should join 144 other countries with its endorsement."

greendem informed us about Moms Turned Mountaineers in Climb Against Coal: "We are four Washington moms, who, on Saturday July 17, will attempt to summit Mount Rainier with a message for our Governor. Our Climb Against Coal challenges Governor Gregoire to close Washington’s largest toxic polluter and point source of deadly carbon: the TransAlta coal-fired power plant in Centralia."

continued at Daily Kos....

Green diary rescue & open thread

by Meteor Blades

An exceptional, deeply satisfying diary published Monday didn't get many eyeballs, so I'm posting a big chunk of it here in hopes that it will whet your appetite for reading the whole piece. It's Mike Stagg 's analysis of how The Deep Water Moratorium Threatens Two Louisiana Republican Oligarchs. Mike posts at Democratic Louisiana:

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. ... So, the moratorium looked like the prudent call until the cause of the BP Gulf Gusher could be identified, the well capped, and a new set of safety rules issued based on what was learned from this incident. But, alarm about the potential impact from the moratorium quickly went up along the coast and from within state government. Tens of thousands of jobs were threatened if the moratorium was allowed to stand. The job loss numbers fluctuated but trended downward in the first weeks after the moratorium was announced. Jindal assigned his newly minted Lieutenant Governor Scott Angelle the task of heading up the effort to generate public opposition to the moratorium. Angelle formed a coalition and had an online petition created. He traveled across the southern part of the state rallying opposition. He met with federal officials, parroting dire predictions of the impact of the moratorium. He followed Jindal's lead and bashed the President. ... Still, the moratorium stuck. Then Hornbeck Offshore Services, LLC, of Covington, announced its intention to file suit challenging the moratorium. It was assigned to Federal District Court Judge Martin Feldman in New Orleans and the rest is history. Feldman overturned the moratorium. Hornbeck was joined in the challenge by 37 other companies in the challenge, giving the impression that a broad swath of the industry opposed the moratorium. The governor's office filed a brief in support of Hornbeck's claim. ... The involvement of these 37 companies did not constitute a broad industry response. It was, instead, a shriek of anger at the federal government that had thrown into jeopardy the empires of two of the key members of the new Republican oligarchy that has been ascendant in Louisiana politics in recent years. The Bollingers and the Chouests were reliable heavy hitters for the party and its causes. In trying to prevent another blowout in the hazardous deep water environment, President Obama had unwittingly delivered would could prove to be a lethal blow to some of some of the wealthiest arch conservative activists in the state. If the President did not realize the full extent of the in-state political implications of the moratorium, it did not take too long to become evident.

Click the link. There's much, much more.

• • • • •

Green diary rescue appears Sundays (except for three-day weekends) and Thursdays. Inclusion of a particular diary does not necessarily mean my agreement with it. The rescue begins below and continues in the jump.

• • • • •

Haole in Hawaii posted A Random Hawaiian Photo Diary.

In case you missed the news over the Independence Day weekend, Eclectablog took note that Obama announces $2 BILLION in solar power investments: "This is an industry and an energy source that needs a kick start. Much of the Recovery Act money that has gone into solar power-related projects has ended up going to foreign companies for the very simple reason that there just aren't that many USA companies to invest in.This is a huge commitment to USA-made solar energy equipment and components. Meanwhile, right here in my own backyard, University of Michigan scientists are figuring out how to make plastic solar cells that have a high enough efficiency that they can compete with standard silicon and thin-film cells."

continued at Daily Kos....

Green diary rescue & open thread

by Meteor Blades

Remember Michael Mann? He is the renowned paleoclimatologist and Pennsylvania State University professor who originated the much-criticized hockey stick temperature graph that appeared in the Third Scientific Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The graph, based on ice cores, tree rings, and other gauges, reconstructed thousands of years of climate fluctuations that showed we are in a helluva mess, with temperatures hotter than they've been in 2000 years.

Subsequently, Mann and some colleagues were defamed in the so-called Climategate affair, when hackers published emails supposedly showing that the scientists' calculations had been doctored with a "trick" to create a climate-change hoax. Much of the mainstream media and the right-wing global-warming denial industry rubbed their hands in glee. And they went to work on the scientists, calling into question three decades of climate work.

However, on Thursday, in the final act of an investigation completed nearly a month ago, Pennsylvania State released a complete exoneration of Mann. The panel that investigated him was unanimous in its findings:

The Investigatory Committee, after careful review of all available evidence, determined that there is no substance to the allegation against Dr. Michael E. Mann, Professor, Department of Meteorology, The Pennsylvania State University.

More specifically, the Investigatory Committee determined that Dr. Michael E. Mann did not engage in, nor did he participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research, or other scholarly activities.

End of controversy. Full stop.

Well, not quite. As Joe Romm points out at Climate Progress, there are some newspapers and other media outlets who owe Mann retractions and apologies. These include Newsweek, CBS and Wall Street Journal reporters Jeffrey Ball and Keith Johnson.

But, of course, the deniers just keep at it. They're aided by newspapers like the Washington Post, whose record on accurately covering climate change is tainted by its editorialists, columnist George Will and some reporters. In a Post story about Mann's exoneration, a prominent global warming denier was given space for rebuttal:

Myron Ebell, a global warming skeptic who directs Energy and Global Warming Policy for the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute, noted that the Penn State ethics review only interviewed one of Mann's critics, MIT climate scientist Richard Lindzen.

"It has been designed as a whitewash," said Ebell, whose group accepts contributions from the energy industry. "To admit that Dr. Mann is a conman now would be extremely embarrassing for Penn State. But the scandal will not be contained no matter how many whitewash reports are issued. The evidence of manipulation of data is too obvious and too strong."

Ebell is a professional liar with zero scientific credentials. Including his industry-funded bullshit in the same section of the newspaper is an affront to decent journalism. But then that is not a unique occurrence at the Post.

• • • • • • •

Green diary rescue appears on Thursdays and Sundays. Inclusion of a particular diary does not indicate my agreement with it. The rescue begins below and continues in the jump.

• • • • • • •

Haole in Hawaii showed us his dazzling photos of Lionfish and Other Amazing Critters, including Imperial Nudibranchs.

environmentalist described an exciting project in The Food Forest - Part I: Strategies for Green Urban Infrastructure: "As we all know, our development practices have created urban and suburban communities that are, for the most part, vast areas of paved surfaces, hot streets, dark roof tops and barren soil that contributes to despoiled water, polluted air and an alienation of people from nature.  And an alienation of people from food. Many diarists here on Dkos have brought forth exciting examples of urban agriculture, urban homesteading and other ways to bring green, clean and liveable to urban centers.  I would like to add to that library by proposing the creation of food forests (forest gardens) in urban public spaces."

continued at Daily Kos....