Month: December 2010

  • U.S. court rules Texas cannot delay EPA – mandated greenhouse gas rules

    A federal court on Wednesday blocked an attempt by Texas to delay the Environmental Protection Agency’s plans to impose carbon regulations in the state early next year. The state of Texas is suing the EPA to prevent the agency from forcing it to issue greenhouse gas permits for the biggest polluters when national carbon rules…

  • Growing Atlantic dead zone shrinks habitat for billfish and tuna, may lead to over-harvest

    A dead zone off the coast of West Africa is reducing the amount of available habitat for Atlantic tuna and billfish species, reports the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in a study published in Fisheries Oceanography. The zone is growing due to rising water temperatures and is expected to cause over-harvest of tuna and billfish…

  • NOAA Website Contains Detailed History of Gulf Oil Disaster

    Yesterday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) made public a new website, the NOAA Deepwater Horizon Library. The site contains a treasure trove of information relating to the oil disaster in the gulf oil disaster. This includes reports on the incident itself, scientific reports on the wildlife affected, and a detailed history of the…

  • On Eve of New Climate Regs, A Primer on Federal Greenhouse Gas Regimes: Part I

    For 2 years industry officials, states, and environmentalists have had 2 January 2011 circled on their calendars. That’s the date greenhouse gases officially become regulated pollutants under the Clean Air Act—a direct result of a 2007 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that carbon dioxide is a pollutant under that law. The Environmental Protection Agency’s…

  • Leviathan Gas Discovery Could be The Mother of All Resource Curses

    They say that fossil fuel riches become a curse to any country that possess them. Where fossil fuels flow – corruption, reduced democracy and increased inequality follow. It is such a recognized pattern that it has become a cliche: the resource curse. No nation is immune. Even one-time staid and fair-minded Canada has now succumbed…

  • Indonesia moves ahead on climate action

    Indonesia has chosen once of its largest and richest provinces to test efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by saving forest and peatlands, a key part of a $1 billion climate deal with Norway. Central Kalimantan province on Borneo island is the second largest producer of greenhouse gases among Indonesia’s 33 provinces because of deforestation,…

  • Denmark Boasts a 100% Renewable Energy Community

    Denmark, like, Germany, her neighbor to the south, is a country that takes renewable energy seriously. The wind energy industry alone in Denmark is booming with companies like Vestas and Siemens Wind Power both having production facilities and bases of operation on Danish soil. Denmark’s own wind based energy also grows exponentially each year leaving…

  • Buried Secrets in the Heart of Tel Aviv

    Archaeologists from Tel Aviv University have unearthed some very interesting historical artifacts at an ancient fortress in the city. The fortress, Tel Qudadi, located at the mouth of the Yarkon River, was first excavated over 70 years ago, but the finds were never published. New evidence from the site indicates a linkage between ancient Israel…

  • Wind Gets Knocked Out of the Pickens Plan

    It was not that long ago when T. Boone Pickens ranked up there on television air time with the Snuggie and the Ped Egg. His commercials, or infomercials, promised that the wind corridor in the central United States, paired with natural gas, would wean the U.S. off of fossil fuel imports and push the country…

  • Climate change: we are like slave-owners

    An economy run on slave labour has much in common with one run on fossil fuels, argues Jean-Francois Mouhot. Ending suffering means we all need to become modern-day abolitionists.