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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Shutdown’s ‘non-essential’ food safety workers discovered essential after all in widespread salmonella outbreak; International community moving forward on climate solutions; Natural Gas War on Coal closes dirty coal plants; “The New Normal” – a time frame for climate change; PLUS: Climate science deniers now denied access to the L.A. Times … All that and more in today’s Green News Report!
Green News Report
with Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen
10/10/2013
‘Green News Report’ – October 10, 2013 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen... · · · · · ‘Green News Report’ – October 10, 2013 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen...
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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): VIDEO: What’s Funnier than a Climate Denier at a Science Fair?; Latest leak at Fukushima plant contaminates 6 workers; ND suffers first big oil spill; Drought the culprit behind CO pine-beetle epidemic; Big Oil sues over ethanol mandate; Enviros urge WGBH to dump Koch on board; Shell exec says oil companies could lead in carbon capture technology; Shutdown means a delay in Keystone XL pipeline review … PLUS: Fusion “Breakthrough” at NIF? [Uh, Not Really] … and much, MUCH more! …
STORIES DISCUSSED IN TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…
- Federal Food Safety Workers Essential After All, And Other Shutdown Impacts:
- USDA may close 3 California poultry plants in salmonella outbreak (L.A. Times): The three plants operated by Foster Farms are blamed for an outbreak of salmonella poisoning that has sickened at least 278 people nationwide.
- VIDEO: USDA threatens to shutter Foster Farms plants tied to salmonella outbreak (NBC News Los Angeles)
- There’s a Major Foodborne Illness Outbreak and the Government’s Shut Down (Wired):
While the government is shut down, with food-safety personnel and disease detectives sent home and forbidden to work, a major foodborne-illness outbreak has begun. This evening, the Food Safety and Inspection Service of the US Department of Agriculture announced that “an estimated 278 illnesses … reported in 18 states” have been caused by chicken contaminated with Salmonella Heidelberg and possibly produced by the firm Foster Farms.
- U.S. Will Suspend Antarctic Program, Major Construction Projects if Shutdown Lingers (Science Magazine)
- U.S. Antarctic research victim of shutdown; losses are irreplaceable (LA Times)
- Nuclear Regulatory Commission To Furlough Employees Due To Government Shutdown (Huffington Post Green)
- 2047: Climate Permanently Shifts to New, Hotter Temperatures:
- Shift to a new climate likely by mid-century: study: (Reuters):
Billions of people could be living in regions where temperatures are hotter than their historical ranges by mid-century, creating a ‘new normal’ that could force profound changes on nature and society, scientists said on Wednesday.
- Global Warming: Record Heat of Today Could Be New Norm in 2047, Study Says (CS Monitor)
- Tropics First Region on Globe To Hit a New Climate Era, Research Finds (Daily Climate)
- Tropics Will Be the First Region To Be Hit Hard By Global Warming (Los Angeles Times)
- D.C. Climate Will Shift in 2047, Researchers Say; Tropics Will Feel Unprecedented Change First (Washington Post)
- The Real Budget Crisis: ‘The CO2 Emissions Budget Framing Is A Recipe For Delaying Concrete Action Now’ (Climate Progress):
The Washington establishment and the media have been mesmerized into inaction by a short-term budget crisis — funding the continued operation of the government. But it is the continued operation of a livable climate that should have their full attention.
- Researchers find historic ocean acidification levels: “The next mass extinction may have already begun” (Climate Progress):
The study finds a “deadly trio” of human-caused effects are proving disastrous for the health of the world’s oceans.
- International Community Moving Forward on Climate Solutions:
- VIDEO: The Economic Case for Climate Action (World Bank Group, International Monetary Fund Seminar 2013)
- IMF, World Bank meetings muffled by U.S. political stalemate (Globe & Mail UK) [emphasis added]:
It is a sad irony that the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank take place this weekend in Washington in the midst of a shutdown of the U.S. government. The meetings, which are held in Washington two years out of every three, should be an opportunity for the world’s greatest economic power to provide leadership on global issues.
- IMF, World Bank heads lend clout to climate change efforts (Thomson Reuters)
- Are There Any Major World Financial Institutions That Don’t Want To Act On Climate? (Climate Progress)
- Zero Carbon By 2100: World must eliminate fossil fuel emissions, OECD chief says (Reuters)
- Kerry: ‘Inviting catastrophe’ on climate (The Hill’s e2 Wire)
- Coal Plants Shut Down in Northeast:
- It continues: Two Pennsylvania coal plants will close for good next week (Grist)
- Brayton Point Power Station in Somerset, largest coal-fired plant in New England, to close by 2017 (MassLive.com)
- DENIED: L.A.Times Will Not Publish Climate Science-Denying LTEs:
- On letters from climate-change deniers (L.A. Times)
‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…
- VIDEO: What’s Funnier than a Climate Denier at a Science Fair? (Climate Crocks): The League of Conservation Voters strikes again with a funny video featuring a climate denying Dad who crashes his daughter’s science fair. Oceanographer Josh Willis has a cameo.
- STUDY: Media Sowed Doubt In Coverage Of UN Climate Report: False Balance And “Pause” Dominated IPCC Coverage (Media Matters):
A study of coverage of the recent United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report finds that many mainstream media outlets amplified the marginal viewpoints of those who doubt the role of human activity in warming the planet, even though the report itself reflects that the climate science community is more certain than ever that humans are the major driver of climate change.
- Fusion “Breakthrough” at NIF? Uh, Not Really … (Science Magazine):
One unintended effect of the U.S. federal shutdown is that helpful press officers at government labs are not available to provide a reality check to some of the wilder stories that can catch fire on the Internet. They would have come in handy this week, when a number of outlets jumped on a report on the BBC News website. The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, it reported, had passed a “nuclear fusion milestone.” NIF uses the world’s highest energy laser system to crush tiny pellets containing a form of hydrogen fuel to enormous temperature and pressure. The aim is to get the hydrogen nuclei to fuse together into helium atoms, releasing energy.
- North Dakota suffers first big oil spill (Reuters):
A Tesoro Logistics LP pipeline has spilled more than 20,000 barrels of crude oil into a rural North Dakota field, the biggest leak in the state since it became a major U.S. producer.
- Latest leak at Japana’s Fukushima plant contaminates 6 workers: (Reuters):
Six workers at Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant were exposed to a leak of highly radioactive water on Wednesday, the latest in a string of mishaps the country’s nuclear watchdog has attributed to carelessness, saying they could have been avoided.
- Massive Spruce Beetle Outbreak In Colorado Caused By Drought: CU-Boulder Study (Huffington Post Green):
“It was interesting that drought was a better predictor for spruce beetle outbreaks than temperature,” said Sarah Hart, CU-Boulder doctoral student and lead study author, in a statement. “The study suggests that spruce beetle outbreaks occur when warm and dry conditions cause stress in the host trees.”
- Big Oil sues over ethanol mandate: (Gannet News Service):
The oil industry Tuesday filed a lawsuit with the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia challenging the government’s estimate of how much ethanol must be blended into the U.S. fuel supply this year. - After Fukushima Disaster, Advocates Argue Only Safe Nuclear Power Is None At All (Huffington Post)
- Nuclear plants vexed at prices that shift as demand does: (NY Times):
As costs and competition from cheap natural gas force more old nuclear plants to shut down, their owners have a new complaint: the electricity market is rigged against them.
- Senators urge protesction of Hanford whistleblower: (L. A. Times):
Two U.S. senators angered by the firing of whistle-blower Walter Tamosaitis from the contaminated Hanford, Wash., nuclear site sharply criticized the U.S. secretary of Energy on Wednesday.
- Enviros urge WGBH to drop Koch from board over climate misinformation: (Huffington Post Green):
An environmental activist group wants Boston’s public television and radio affiliate to bump billionaire conservative donor David Koch from its board of trustees over his position on climate change.
- Shell Exec Says Oil Companies Might Become Carbon Capture Ones (MIT): An expert from Shell says that oil companies, with their deep knowledge of geophysics, are well-suited to pioneer carbon capture and storage technology.
- U.S. government shutdown could delay Keystone XL pipeline review (Reuters):
“We cannot make any predictions on the timing – we haven’t before and can’t now,” the official said. “We are working as best as we can under the circumstances,” to finalize the draft review.
- How to Slice a Global Carbon Pie? (NY Times) [emphasis added]:
[T]o have the best chance of not exceeding the international target for global warming of 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, society can burn no more than about 1 trillion tons of carbon, in the form of fossil fuels, and spew the resulting gases into the atmosphere. More than half that carbon budget has been used already.
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In essence, the scientists were putting a big carbon pie on the table and asking: How are we going to carve this thing up? - Who created the global warming ‘pause’? (Chris Mooney, Grist):
How did a narrative almost opposite to the scientific consensus that human activities are causing climate change get started? Misinformation was spread by climate skeptics, aided by journalists and scientists themselves.
- VIDEO: Panel Says We’re Close to ‘Danger Point’ (Weather Channel)
- What Our Idyllic, Non-Dystopian Future Would Look Like If We Fixed the World (Motherboard/VICE):
The book, The World We Made: Alex McKay’s Story from 2050, is told through the perspective of Alex, the non gender-specific protagonist living in the year 2050, reflecting on how the world came back from the brink of destruction. It’s due to come out next month.
FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page
Thanx for the snark kids!!!