Fossil Energy

Breaking Bad: A 5-billion-metric-ton hunk of ice is "poised" to break away from the largest glacier in the northern hemisphere, say independent scientists working with enviro-advocacy group Greenpeace. The researchers are observing the glacier from the Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise.

If and when the Manhattan-sized "tongue" of ice detaches from the Petermann glacier, on Greenland's northwest coast, the mass of land-bound ice behind it may flow downhill and melt more quickly. It's the introduction of this landbound freshwater ice into the world's seas that will likely lead to rises in sea levels.

"Ocean warming currents are circulating around the fjord here and eroding the underbelly of Petermann glacier at an incredible rate, which is 25 times that of the surface melt," Dr Alun Hubbard, a glaciologist at the University Of Wales. (The Sydney Morning Herald, New Scientist)

Coooooooal! A coal plant construction "bubble" will result in 43 new coal plants in the US in the next five years -- and none of them will be regulated by the climate legislation currently being debated in Congress. The 43 are permitted, near construction, or already being built, and thus will fall under the federal designation "progressing projects," and evade caps on their carbon dioxide pollution. "The 43 progressing plants are projected to add four times that generating capacity – 22,236 MW – in the coming five years. Collectively, they will produce more than 150 million tons of new CO2 emissions every year for many decades." (SolveClimate)

Pond Scum of the Earth: Depending on your point of view, it's either great news or awful news that petro-giant ExxonMobil is investing more than half a million dollars in developing biofuel from algae. In a partnership with biotech entrepreneur Craig Ventner's Synthetic Genomics, Exxon will sink $600 million into deriving biofuel from the slimy green stuff. Algae is considered a hot prospect for biofuel development, since no one eats it. (Associated Press)

A View to a Risk: The head of the Nigerian equivalent of FEMA says that the nation is extremely vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Mohammed Audu-Bida "said the climate change had already manifested in the country with sea level rise leading to coastal and marine erosion and flooding, particularly in South- South and South-West, and bleaching of coral reefs along the coastal zone. The NEMA boss warned that with certain percentage of the population living within the coast and most cities concentrated along the coastline, the vulnerability to marine-induced disasters from tidal waves and storm surges would also increase." (This Day online)

The Vanishing:"The song of the skylark is the quintessential sound of an English summer," reports the Daily Mail. "But now, because of global warming, it faces being drowned out - by the chirrup of crickets." Skylark populations in England have dropped by 53%, since 1970. Populations two species of crickets once found only on the Sceptered Isle's southernmost tips have grown sixfold, meanwhile, and extended their range northward. (Daily Mail)

Sink or ~~Swim~~ Sink: Indonesia's Environment Minister says that developing nations like India, Brazil and China will destroy archepelagic nations if they don't agree to binding 2020 targets for cutting heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions. ""The countries have even been unable to set the target for emission reduction in 2050," said Rachmat Witoelar this past Tuesday. "While these countries are hesitant to take real action, island countries will probably disappear from the world map." (Jakarta Post)

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Palin's Higher Calling? Fame, Fortune via Global Warming Denial

by Emily Gertz

category: Fossil Energy

Published July 14, 2009 @ 02:32PM PT

Does Sarah Palin understand global warming, why it's happening, and how to slow it down? In the wake of her opinion piece in today's edition of The Washington Post, in which she rehashes several false arguments against carbon cap and trade, as well as other parts of the clean energy legislation in front of Congress, we don't really know.

But those aren't the right questions to be asking, really. The real question is how far she will advance her political ambitions on the exhaust of global warming denial.

Naturally, according to Palin, America's energy security and national security will be ensured only if we drill, baby, drill. (It won't.) Charitably, she's displaying her storied grasp of factual information and public policy details. But it's equally likely that Palin's embracing the "cap and tax" crowd for the cynical purpose of walking an easy path to political fame and personal fortune.

(Which isn't to say she shouldn't be debunked. Media Matters has done a fast, good job of clearing the fog from around Palin's op-ed on federal climate and energy legislation, which is chock-full of misinformation. And let's recall that in an interview last summer, Palin did deny the reality of global warming. "A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location," she said. "I'm not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.")

Give the woman credit: By applying her charisma, sex appeal, and will to power to national energy policy, Palin has made a crafty move. Here's why:

First of all, she'll bring a surface gloss of expertise to energy security issues; she was governor of oil and gas-stoked Alaska for two and a half years, right? And before that sat on an important state oil and gas board for all of 11 months. It's sufficiently plausible believability to keep her narrow base of conservative supporters in tow. (Although keep in mind that for this crowd, the facts ultimately don't matter, and Palin understands that.)

This same veneer of energy security acumen may entice a few fellow politicians (who might otherwise opt to keep Sarah Barracuda and her swirl of crazy at arm's length) to use Palin to advance their own anti-climate/clean energy agendas.

Second, skepticism toward carbon cap-and-trade markets has a ready audience among libertarian and some independent voters, the only arenas where Palin has any potential to expand her base. These voters have been made wary of the House energy and climate legislation (softened up, so to speak) by the flood of disinformation preceding Palin onto the scene.

Third, Palin -- demonstrably no slouch when it comes to identifying a free meal -- has surely noticed that there's a lot of money to be made in professionally opposing cap and trade, which goes hand in hand with organized global warming denial. ExxonMobil alone gave millions to such groups between 2002 and 2005. Last year, as the UK's Telegraph newspaper reported a couple weeks ago, ExxonMobil gave gave $75,000 to the National Center for Policy Analysis, $50,000 to the Heritage Foundation, and $245,000 to the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.

Opponents of the Obama administration's plans for expanding clean energy and fighting global warming are probably thrilled to have Sarah Palin's pearly whites smiling in their direction. But the reality-based world can take heart by remembering that Palin's bright light has often overexposed matters she and others hoped would remain in the dark.

So pay attention as Palin embraces energy and climate policy as her "higher calling." Her presence may ultimately prove as helpful to the global warming denialists as it was to the McCain campaign, and her loyalty as true.

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Across the Change-i-verse

by Emily Gertz

category: Fossil Energy

Published July 12, 2009 @ 06:24PM PT

14-year-old Alec Loorz, founder of Kids vs Global Warming

Highlights of the past week's blogging by the smart, talented, and good looking editors at Change.org:

Youth Taking Action: Kids vs. Global Warming: The Social Entrepreneurship blog chats with Ashoka Youth Venturer Alec Loorz, 14, founder of Kids vs. Global Warming. On positive ways to make change, Alec says, "Even though the actions we need to take might seem small in comparison to the enormity of the problem, every thing we do brings us one step closer to making the shift that we, as a whole society, need to make," says this remarkable peer organier. "It's also true that we can recycle and ride bikes all day long and we still won't be making a huge dent in the problem. Our whole world needs to get serious and make big changes. We need to be involved in the changes that governments and businesses need to make too."

Is Oil Ever NOT Connected to War? On the occasion of Sudan joining the African Petroleum Producers Association (APPA), Stop Genocide editor Michelle notes that the membership is composed of nations with striking histories of civil war and human rights abuses. "And to Energy Gluttons elsewhere in the world: How often do you stop to think about the human cost of your weekly fill-up?"

Climate Change, People and Poverty: Humanitarian Relief editor Michael Kleinman has put together a good resource page on the Humanitarian Impact of Climate Change.

The Slave Behind Your Bargain: Another example of just how interlinked human rights abuses and environmental pollution have become: "[H]ave you ever wondered why that bookshelf or tennis ball or t-shirt is so cheap? Have you ever wondered if a slave is paying the cost of your bargain?", writes End Human Trafficking editor Amanda Kloer. "The Human Trafficking Project writes about the prevalence of slave-made consumer goods on the market...They also share some hopeful ideas, like whole towns committing to selling only fair trade goods. However, the fact is that slave-made goods are in every part of our lives, and in many cases they are bringing us the bargains we so love."

Amada frequently highlights Fair Trade products on the HT blog in her "Red Light Specials." This week it was Cocoa Minty Lip Balm.

A caricature-buster, via Dave Bennion at the Immigrat Rights blog: GOP Voters Support Path to Citizenship for Undocumented Immigrants

Immigration Restrictionists Make Bad Environmentalists: Dave also makes a great catch on the real motivations of immigration reform opponents who make an environmental case for their arguments: "[T]he members of Congress that NumbersUSA, [an anti-immigration John Tanton-organized] outfit, rates most highly on immigration policy voted against the recent Waxman-Markey climate change bill by a margin of more than 5 to 1."

Dave's Open Letter to John Tanton on Global Warming asks, "Will you ask Congress to support ACES and other environmentally-friendly legislation? Or will you continue to assert that policies that limit immigration, rather than those that limit carbon emissions, are the key to slowing climate change?

Obama's Nominee for FWS: No Friend to Endangered Species: According to Animal Rights editor Stephanie Ernst, "Obama has nominated, to enforce the Endangered Species Act as head of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Sam Hamilton: the FWS official with 'by far the weakest record on Endangered Species Act enforcement of any comparable official in the country'...Obama is no animal rights advocate, but surely he can do better--and the animals deserve better--than Sam Hamilton."

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Suggest a story to Stop Global Warming

by Emily Gertz

category: Fossil Energy

Published July 10, 2009 @ 08:01AM PT

Image of the Earth on August 2, 2005, from NASA's Messenger spacecraft.

Use this form to submit a news tip, story, video, or link for editorial review.

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Please include a permalink, not the top level URL/general link to an entire site

Tell us a little about the item and why it's a good one for Stop Global Warming

Please don't use this form for any kind of personal or professional note to the editors and writers of SGW or Change.org. We're all pretty easy to find via email, which is the better medium for such messages.

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Boxer, Jackson Blast Sen. Barrasso's "Suppressed EPA Memo" Meme

by Emily Gertz

category: Fossil Energy

Published July 07, 2009 @ 10:57AM PT

Sen. John Barrasso Did you hear the one about how the Obama administration is fostering a "culture of secrecy and suppression" of science?

That was the claim made by Senator John Barrasso (R-Wy.). At this morning's hearing of the Environment and Public Works Committee, Sen. Barrasso spent most of his time projecting onto the Obama administration a phenomenon he didn't seem to mind when it was actually practiced by the Bush-Cheney administration: censorship of scientific data on climate change, and suppression of the words and works of federal employees.

While Democratic and some of his GOP colleagues spent the morning discussing how to take action on clean energy and global warming with four members of the Obama cabinet, Sen. Barrasso tried to hamstring the hearing. He charged that an EPA economist was squelched from above when he disagreed with the agency's endangerment finding on carbon dioxide.

"What I've seen so far is an administration that is saying, yes we can hide the truth, yes we can hide the facts, and yes we can intimidate career government employees," said Sen. Barrasso.

Calling the accusation of censoring science "a brutal charge to levy," Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), the committee chair, addressed it to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson.

"I will be brief, because I think this committee has more important and substantive issues to deal with," said Ms. Jackson.

Citing materials released by the free-market advocacy think tank Competitive Enterprise Institute, including an exchange of emails between the EPA staffer at the creamy center of this story and his managers, Jackson stated that the "facts do not justify the CEI release."

The EPA employee, economist Alan Carlin, was given permission and encouraged to speak his mind, and find peer-reviewed work to back up his disagreement to the EPA's finding, she said. "I personally instructed staff that Carlin should feel free to circulate [his] memo to anyone he wished," Jackson said, adding, "I don't believe process debates like this are serving the American people" by finding solutions to clean energy generation and ways to stop global warming.

As Grist reporter Jonathan Hiskes has written, there's nothing to speak of to this conspiracy allegation by Sen. Barrasso and others on the right. "EPA Press Secretary Adora Andy noted that Carlin’s education and work expertise are largely in economics, not climatology," says Hiskes. "That’s why his comments on climate science were not included" in the endangerment finding.

Carlin's own report does not back up CEI's allegations, says Hiskes, and recycles several well-debunked global warming hoaxes: that the science is so rapidly evolving that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's reports cannot be trusted; that the globe is really cooling; that the mass of Greenland's ice cap is stable; and others.

The science in the document doesn't hold up. NASA climatologist Gavin Schmidt wrote on RealClimate (and Hiskes reposted to Grist, as I'm reposting here):

...what solid peer reviewed science do they cite for support? A heavily-criticised blog posting showing that there are bi-decadal periods in climate data and that this proves it was the sun wot done it. The work of an award-winning astrologer (one Theodor Landscheidt, who also thought that the rise of Hitler and Stalin were due to cosmic cycles), a classic Courtillot paper we've discussed before, the aforementioned FoS web page, another web page run by Doug Hoyt, a paper by Garth Paltridge reporting on artifacts in the NCEP reanalysis of water vapour that are in contradiction to every other reanalysis, direct observations and satellite data, a complete reprint of another un-peer reviewed paper by William Gray, a nonsense paper by Miskolczi etc. etc.

I'm not quite sure how this is supposed to compete with the four rounds of international scientific and governmental review of the IPCC or the rounds of review of the CCSP reports ...

...Finally, they end up with the oddest claim in the submission: That because human welfare has increased over the twentieth century at a time when CO2 was increasing, this somehow implies that no amount of CO2 increases can ever cause a danger to human society. This is just boneheadly stupid.

So in summary, what we have is a ragbag collection of un-peer reviewed web pages, an unhealthy dose of sunstroke, a dash of astrology and more cherries than you can poke a cocktail stick at. Seriously, if that's the best they can do, the EPA's ruling is on pretty safe ground.

There are many really substantive critiques to make of the House clean energy and climate legislation, and whatever version the Senate will eventually take up. These policies warrant serious discussion and consideration in Congress.

Instead, Sen. Barrasso is falling down on the job. He is using falsehoods to try and block much-needed debates of and advancements on energy and climate policy, instead of engaging on the real issues. It's a mystery why his constituents don't demand better.