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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Green medals at the Vancouver Olympics; Early spring in Japan; Slow boats to China; EPA under fire ... PLUS: Climate change legislation --- not dead yet! ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!
Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.
IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA': Is the Bloom Box really a "breakthrough"?; Solar Power in the Remotest Places; Dams to be removed on Klamath River; Shipper fined for SF Bay oil spill; Google approved to become electric utility; Top scientists confirm climate consensus; Scientist: "Climate changes are proven fact"; Fact-checking the "Skeptical Environmentalist; George Will's latest column is just sad; Cyber-bullying, death threats for Australian climate scientists ... PLUS: Journalistic malpractice on global warming...
Info/links on those stories and all the ones we talked about on today's episode follow below...
- Quick Hits:
- Recycled Materials in Olympics (Mother Jones)
- India computer waste to grow 500 pct by 2020: report: Waste from discarded electronics will rise dramatically in the developing world within a decade, with computer waste in India alone to grow by 500 percent from 2007 levels by 2020, a U.N. study released on Monday said. (Reuters)
- RECYCLE YOUR ELECTRONICS RESPONSIBLY: E-Stewards: The globally responsible way to recycle your electronics (Basel Action Network)
- Slow Trip Across Sea Aids Profit and Environment (NY Times)
- Utilities Finding Peer Pressure a Powerful Motivator (Green Inc.)
- Not Dead Yet!: Senate Climate & Clean Energy Legislation May Be Introduced This Week:
- Senate weighs final push to move climate bill: The Obama administration would prefer to let Congress set climate change policy. But if it is unable to, the White House wants the EPA as a fallback. (Reuters)
- Obama Mounts a Last-Ditch Attempt to Pass a 'Hybrid' Climate and Energy Bill (ClimateWire)
- EPA Under Fire: States, Industries, Conservative Think Tanks Sue to Block EPA:
- 16 'Endangerment' Lawsuits Filed Against EPA Before Deadline (Greenwire)
- States seek to intervene in challenge to EPA's endangerment finding: A coalition of 16 states and New York City is asking a federal appeals court to allow it to intervene in a lawsuit attacking U.S. EPA's endangerment finding. (Greenwire)
- Coal State Dems Question EPA Climate Regs (Mother Jones)
- Chamber Kicks Off Legal Battle Over Carbon Regs (Mother Jones)
- Going Rogue on Endangerment: A rogues’ gallery of science-denying coal and oil companies, industry lobbyists and trade associations, right-wing advocacy groups, and ultra-conservative elected officials have lined up to sue the Environmental Protection Agency over its landmark “endangerment finding”. (NRDC)
- Can Lawsuits Stop The EPA's Carbon Rules? (The New Republic)
- Four States Challenge EPA Authority, Scientific Findings:
- Alabama, Virginia file petitions, join 'endangerment' foes in U.S. court (Climatewire)
- Virginia challenges U.S. greenhouse gas curbs (Washington Post)
- Texas challenging EPA's greenhouse gas finding (AP)
- TRANSCRIPT: Texas Gov. Rick Perry: Texas Takes Legal Action Against EPA Mandates; Doubts about scientific basis and threat to Texas jobs drive filing (Office of the Governor of Texas)
- But Those States' Own Climatologists Disagree:
- Texas State Climatologist Disputes State’s Denier Petition: Greenhouse Gases ‘Clearly Present A Danger To The Public Welfare’ (Think Progress)
- Refuting Cuccinelli Denier Petition, Virginia Climate Scientists See ‘Great Risk’ From Greenhouse Gases (Think Progress)
- Catholic radio ad asks Senator Landrieu to stand with Louisiana’s Children, not Polluters (Catholics United)
- The EPA Bows to Coal State Pressure; Agrees to Delay Regulations:
- Coal-state Dems hit EPA on climate (Washington Post)
- Lisa Jackson Announces EPA Will Delay And Weaken Proposed Greenhouse Standards (Think Progress)
- EPA to soften CO2 requirements on industry: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said on Monday it would slow a phase-in of new limits on carbon dioxide from coal and other heavy industry plants to ease concerns about the impact on the economy. (Reuters)
- EPA's climate overture doesn't impress Rockefeller (Washington Post)
'GREEN NEWS EXTRA': More green news not covered in today's audio report...
- Bloom Box: What is it and how does it work?: A '60 Minutes' Bloom Box segment has many excited about the home power plant. Is it too good to be true? (Christian Science Monitor)
- Making Solar Power Portable (NY Times)
- Agreement Reached on Klamath River (Green Inc.)
- Operators of cargo ship in SF Bay spill fined $10M (AP)
- Google gets go-ahead to buy, sell energy (CNET)
- Top Scientists Affirm Consensus on Global Warming (Environmental News Service)
- The Latest on IPCC, Phil Jones "Controversies", Climate Change Deniers:
- Fact Checking the Skeptical Environmentalist:
Danish political scientist Bjørn Lomborg has made his fame and a fortune as a climate change skeptic; Howard Friel took on the unenviable task of fact checking Lomborg's sources. Friel found enough to be skeptical about in Lomborg's findings to write a whole book, The Lomborg Deception. (Mother Jones) - OP-ED: Climate changes are proven fact: "[I]n spite of all its complexity and uncertainties, we should not lose track of the simple fact that theory, actual observations of the planet, and complex models - however imperfect each is in isolation - all point to ongoing, potentially dangerous human alteration of climate." (Boston Globe)
- Willy Nilly Silly: George Will Lies About Phil Jones: "It is not the scientists whose view of science is dictated by ideology. It is “conservatives” like Will, who reason that if a problem cannot be solved by the “free market,” then that problem must be either unimportant or nonexistent." (The New Yorker)
- A Forest of Examples: "[George] Will should be fired. I do not say this because I disagree with him; I say this he is being an breathtakingly irresponsible demagogue and has shown himself willing to talk irresponsible lies in order to destroy somebody's career and reputation. George Will deserves to be fired for this column. He won't be, but there you go." (Whiskey Fire)
- Cyber-Bullying, lies and the rise of right-wing climate denial: The purpose of this new form of cyber-bullying seems clear; it is to upset and intimidate the targets, making them reluctant to participate further in the climate change debate or to change what they say... to drive people out of the public debate. (Australian Broadcasting Corp.)
- Journalistic malpractice on global warming (The Economist):
That Daily Mail headline is a lie. Phil Jones did not say there had been no global warming since 1995; he said the opposite.
...
What's truly infuriating about this episode of journalistic malpractice is that, once again, it illustrates the reasons why the East Anglia scientists adopted an adversarial attitude towards information management with regard to outsiders and the media. They were afraid that any data they allowed to be characterised by non-climate scientists would be vulnerable to propagandistic distortion. And they were right.