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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Lights out for the last nuclear power plant in California; Federal judge strikes down new rules for fracking on public lands; Study finds high level of toxic chemicals in residents who live near fracking sites; PLUS: Researchers in Iceland figure out how to turn carbon emissions into stone… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!
Green News Report
with Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen
6/23/2016
‘Green News Report’ – June 23, 2016 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen... · · · · · ‘Green News Report’ – June 23, 2016 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen...
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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): How The Battery Revolution Will Change How You Fly; Chinese State Media Say 51 Killed by Powerful Tornado; Raging Wildfires in the Southwest Stretch Resources; Cities Forge World’s Largest Alliance To Curb Climate Change; Obama Signs TSCA Reform Into Law; Cancer Is Contagious Among Clams. What About Us?;
Op-Ed: “The World’s Disappearing Sand”; Great Lakes Governors Approve Waukesha Water Request… PLUS: Solar Plane Lands In Spain After Historic Atlantic Crossing… and much, MUCH more! …
STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…
- Lights out for California’s last nuclear plant:
- California’s last nuclear plant to close amid longstanding earthquake concerns (Guardian UK):
Environmentalists had pressed the Nuclear Regulatory Commission increasingly to close Diablo given its proximity to seismic faults in the earthquake-prone state. One fault runs 650 yards (595m) from the plant’s reactors. Worries of earthquakes fracturing the facility have been a dominant theme since PG&E first announced plans for Diablo Canyon in the 1960s. The project helped consolidate opposition to nuclear power within the country’s then-fledgling environmental movement.
- Fracking: High levels of toxic chemicals in residents near fracking sites:
- People Near Wyoming Fracking Town Show Elevated Levels of Toxic Chemicals (Inside Climate News):
Researchers tested air pollution in Pavillion, Wyo., along with local residents, suggesting a link between the toxic chemicals released and biological impacts.
- Stanford researchers show fracking’s impact to drinking water sources (Stanford Univ.):
A case study of a small Wyoming town reveals that practices common in the fracking industry may have widespread impacts on drinking water resources.
- Study Finds Chemicals In Residents Living Near Gas Wells (Cliamte Progress)
- Federal judge strikes down proposed fracking regulations:
- Oh frack: Obama’s fracking regulations hit a speedbump, not a brick wall
- Wikipedia fracking exemptions
- Hot Mess: States Struggle To Deal With Radioactive Fracking Waste (Center for Public Integrity):
Potentially dangerous drilling byproducts are being dumped in landfills throughout the Marcellus Shale with few controls/
- 66 million dead trees in California:
- 66 million dead trees in California could fuel ‘catastrophic’ wildfires, officials say (Guardian UK):
Trees are dying at an ‘unprecedented’ rate due to drought, warmer weather and a bark beetle epidemic, prompting the US agriculture secretary’s warning
- Forest Service Survey Finds Record 66 Million Dead Trees in Southern Sierra Nevada, Underscores Need for Congress to Take Action on Fire Budget Fix (USFS)
- 66 million dead trees contribute to fire hazard in California (CNN)
- Innovation: Icelandic researchers turn CO2 to stone:
- The CarbFix Project (CarbFix)
- CO2 turned into stone in Iceland in climate change breakthrough (Guardian UK):
Radical new technique promises a cheaper and more secure method of burying CO2 emissions underground instead of storing it as a gas
- Scientists turn chief global warming gas into harmless stone (AP) [emphasis added]:
When an international team of scientists pumped a carbon dioxide and water mix into underground basalt rocks, basic chemistry took over. The acidic mixture dissolved the rocks’ calcium magnesium and formed limestone, a permanent natural jail for the heat-trapping gas…“What’s going on here is a natural process being accelerated.”
- Pilot test of storing carbon dioxide in rocks is highly effective (Ars Technica):
Pilot project yields impressive results but may be difficult to replicate.
- Engineers set to convert carbon dioxide into solid rock (Guardian UK, 4/19/2009)
‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…
- Solar Plane Lands In Spain After Historic Atlantic Crossing (Huffington Post):
An airplane powered solely by the sun landed safely in Seville in Spain early on Thursday after an almost three-day flight across the Atlantic from New York in one of the longest legs of the first ever fuel-less flight around the world.
- How The Battery Revolution Will Change How You Fly (Climate Progress):
On Friday, NASA named an all-electric plane — the X-57 — as its latest futuristic aircraft. The X-57 will be powered by 14 electric motors driving propellers integrated into a new, narrow wing design. The battery revolution is truly taking flight: NASA has begun working on an effort “to help a significant portion of the aircraft industry transition to electrical propulsion within the next decade.”
- Chinese State Media Say 51 Killed by Powerful Tornado (AP):
Tornados occasionally strike southern China during the summer months, but rarely with the scale of death and damage caused by the one on Thursday.
- Raging Wildfires in the Southwest Stretch Resources (NY Times):
Firefighters across Arizona and New Mexico battled 31 wildfires on Wednesday, their efforts complicated by a relentless heat wave and bone-dry conditions. And in the Angeles National Forest, on the northern edge of Los Angeles, two fires kept more than 300 families from their homes as the fires threatened to merge into one.
- Cities Forge World’s Largest Alliance To Curb Climate Change (Reuters):
Cities in six continents joined up to form the world’s largest alliance to combat climate change on Wednesday, a move intended to help making ground-level changes to slow global warming.
- Obama Signs TSCA Reform Into Law (E&E News):
President Obama signed into law [Wednesday] the first overhaul to the nation’s chemical laws in nearly 40 years, a milestone in the history of environmental legislation and a feather in the caps of Democrats and Republicans alike.
- Cancer Is Contagious Among Clams. What About Us? (NY Times):
The ocean contains a vast number of living things, including many, many pathogens — from bacteria that thrive on coral to fungi that infect lobsters. A drop of seawater may hold 10 million viruses. Recently, a team of scientists revealed a frightening member of this menagerie: free-floating cancer cells that cause contagious tumors in shellfish.
- Op-Ed: “The World’s Disappearing Sand” (NY Times):
Believe it or not, we use more of this natural resource than any other except water and air. Sand is the thing modern cities are made of.
- Zika Deal in Congress Likely to Be Delayed Until After Recess (NY Times):
Emergency financing to fight the mosquito-borne Zika virus appeared likely to be delayed until after Congress returns from its Fourth of July recess, as Democrats on Wednesday sharply criticized a new Republican proposal to provide $1.1 billion, but with $750 million redirected from other federal programs.
- Tesla Offers $2.8 Billion For SolarCity In ‘No Brainer’ Deal For Musk (Reuters):
Elon Musk on Tuesday sought to build a clean energy powerhouse as his electric car maker, Tesla Motors Inc, made an offer to buy his solar installation firm SolarCity Corp in a stock deal worth as much as $2.8 billion.
- Great Lakes Governors Approve Waukesha Water Request (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel):
Delegates for the governors of the eight Great Lakes states on Tuesday unanimously approved the City of Waukesha’s request for a Lake Michigan water supply.
- Flint Agrees To Move Forward With Plans To Connect To KWA (MLive):
City officials announced that Flint will follow through with an agreement to connect the Karegnondi Water Authority pipeline to Lake Huron.
- Kids In Some U.S. Cities Have Dangerously High Blood Lead Levels (Reuters):
In some U.S. cities, at least one in seven kids have unsafe levels of lead in their blood, indicating exposure to a toxic metal that can lead to lifelong physical, mental and behavioral health problems, a recent study suggests.
- Trader Joe’s reaches settlement over Clean Air Act violation claims (Guardian UK):
Grocery chain agrees to reduce leakage of hydrochlorofluorocarbons and pay $500,000 fine after US officials claim it did not promptly repair refrigerators
- Exxon Loses Bid to Fight Virgin Islands Climate Subpeona in State Court (Inside Climate News):
Judge’s motion sets the stage for the company’s legal challenge to proceed in federal court…Without elaboration, U.S. District Judge Ed Kinkeade rejected Exxon’s arguments that the case should be tried in a state court where it was originally filed in April.
- NOAA confirms it: temperatures across Earth’s land and sea surfaces are still running at record highs (Discover):
[H]uman-caused global warming may slow a bit, or even plateau temporarily. That wouldn’t be unusual, since the upward trend in global average temperatures due to humankind’s emissions of greenhouse gases does not run in a straight line.
- Want to fight climate change? Here are the 7 critical life changes you should make (Grist) [emphasis added]:
So, given the imperfections of this world, what is a lone wolf such as yourself to do? Here are some conclusions gleaned from this study: 1. Buy the most fuel-efficient car you can afford, then drive it as little as possible….
FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page
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