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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Climate bill finally drops in the Senate — but can it pass?; UK eyes offshore energy development as well (but goes for wind, not oil!) … PLUS: Blame Game Round Robin as the BP “Oilpocalypse” continues on record pace and hopes hang on a “top hat”… 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’: Oil Spill Hinders Space Shuttle Fuel Tank Delivery; Will ban on Gulf fishing help out fish?; Solar can provide 22 percent world’s power by 2050: IEA; Venezuela Offshore Rig Sinks; Exxon CEO Whines About Push To Cut Big Oil’s Subsidies; Bisphenol A’s ‘twin’ may have more potent hormone effects; N.M. Salt Beds Could Become Nation’s Nuclear Dump … PLUS: For Summer Sentinels, a Firefly Count …
Info/links on those stories and all the ones we talked about on today’s episode follow below…
- Climate Bill Unveiled:
- READ IT: The American Power Act [.pdf] (Washington Post)
- John Kerry: Introducing the American Power Act: On strategy and substance (Grist)
- Kerry unveils climate bill (Scientific American)
- The Climate Bill’s Delicate Offshore Drilling Compromise (The New Republic)
- Compare & Contrast: A First Look At The Details Of The Kerry-Lieberman American Power Act (Wonk Room)
- Power play: A roundup of reactions to the Kerry-Lieberman American Power Act (Grist)
- 1,000-page climate bill unveiled, faces uphill battle (The Hill)
- Bill would let states veto offshore drilling (NOLA Times-Picayune)
- Senate climate bill unveiled; fate uncertain: A U.S. Senate compromise bill aimed at battling global warming would cut emissions of greenhouse gases 17 percent by 2020 (Reuters)
- Amid Conflict, a Consensus on Efficiency (NY Times)
- Manufacturers Comment on Kerry-Lieberman Climate Change Bill (National Association of Manufacturers press release)
- BUT WILL IT BE ENOUGH? Five possible scenarios for our future climate: With talks in Copenhagen descending into chaos, the prospects for stabilising temperatures below ‘dangerous’ levels look increasingly slim. Here are five possible scenarios for our future climate. (Guardian UK)
- BP Oil Spill Disaster Update:
- CHART: Compare the Exxon Valdez and BP Oil Spills (National Wildlife Federation)
- BP makes enough profit in four days to cover the costs of the spill cleanup thus far. (Think Progress)
- Hundreds of Dead Fish Wash Up on Public Beach in Alabama After Oil Sightings (Photos + Video) (Treehugger)
- BP delays ‘top hat’ dome action as spill threatens U.S. coast (Reuters)
- Gas surge shut well a couple of weeks before Gulf oil spill (Times-Picayune)
- Dead dolphins wash up on the Gulf Coast. (Think Progress, NRDC)
- BP Oil Spill Disaster Investigations:
- With Lotsa Docs, too!: Hearing on “Inquiry into the Deepwater Horizon Gulf Coast Oil Spill” (House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Wednesday, 12 May 2010)
- US lawmakers: Key oil rig device had leak (AFP):
House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman, a Democrat, zeroed in on the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling platform’s “blowout preventer,” meant to stop sudden, dangerous rushes of volatile oil and gas.
“We have learned from Cameron, the manufacturer of the blowout preventer, that the device had a leak in a crucial hydraulic system and a defectively configured ram,” designed to seal off an oil well’s pipes, Waxman said.”
This leak was found in the hydraulic system that provides emergency power to the shear rams, which are the devices that are supposed to cut the drill pipe and seal the well,” said Democratic Representative Bart Stupak.
- Oil spill investigators find critical problems in blowout preventer (Washington Post):
A House energy panel investigation has found that the blowout preventer that failed to stop a huge oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico had a dead battery in its control pod, leaks in its hydraulic system, a “useless” test version of a key component and a cutting tool that wasn’t strong enough to shear through steel joints in the well pipe and stop the flow of oil.
- Kenner hearing: Some Coast Guard oil rig safety regulations outdated (NOLA Times-Picayune)
- Congressional investigation reveals oil rig’s blowout preventer had a hydraulic system leak (AP)
- Red Flags Were Ignored Aboard Doomed Rig (Wall St. Journal):
Congress Zeros In on BP Decisions to Forge Ahead With Key Work on Deepwater Horizon Despite Some Worrisome Tests:
Managers at oil giant BP PLC decided to forge ahead in finishing work on the doomed Deepwater Horizon rig despite some tests suggesting that highly combustible gas had seeped into the well, according to testimony released by congressional investigators and documents seen by The Wall Street Journal.The move to start withdrawing heavy drilling fluid that prevents gas from escaping the well, despite some worrisome tests and before a final cement plug could be placed in the well, raises questions about the judgments made on the rig in the hours before an explosion erupted into the night air of April 20, killing 11 and eventually leaving oil pouring into the Gulf of Mexico.
- Oil Rig Evidence Points To Lack Of Regulation (NPR)
- Stupak stunner: Oil well’s blowout preventer had leaks, dead battery, design flaws, “How can a device that has 260 failure modes be considered fail-safe?” (Climate Progress):
Coast Guard Captain slams industry “self-certification” of BOP, “Manufactured by industry, installed by industry, with no government witnessing oversight of the installation or the construction.” And the rig flew the Marshall Island flag to further escape U.S. oversight.
- Congress quizzes oil executives, BP tries new fix (Reuters)
- Kenner, LA Hearing: Gulf of Mexico oil leak hearing highlights extent to which industry polices its own drilling work (Times-Picayune)
- Kenner, LA hearing: Coast Guard inspections differ for ‘foreign flag’ vessels (Times-Picayune)
- Kenner, LA Hearing: Riveting testimony on oil rig rescue effort: Workers on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig leaped eight stories into the Gulf of Mexico after the huge natural gas explosion, witnesses tell a federal hearing in Louisiana. (LA Times)
- Kenner, LA Hearing: Finger-Pointing, but Few Answers at Hearings on Drilling (NY Times)
- Training Exercises Revealed Gaps in Preparedness for Major Oil Spill: Lack of Experience, Poor Communications and Conflicting Roles Cited (ABC News):
As early as 2002, the practice runs showed that oil companies not only lacked updated equipment to mount an effective response to a spill, but would need to be forced by the government to invest in better technology.
“Without requirements in place to require use of new response technologies they will not be developed and deployed adequately,” said an after-action report from the summer 2002 drill that simulated an oil leak from a sunken rig in the Gulf of Mexico that was eerily similar to the current disaster. “There is little incentive for [oil companies] to invest in them and therefore, little incentive for technology companies to develop or refine these technologies further.”
- Criminal charges likely from Gulf oil spill, legal experts say (McClatchy DC)
‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’: More green news not covered in today’s audio report…
- Oil Spill Hinders Space Shuttle Fuel Tank Delivery (Space.com)
- Will Gulf Fish Get a Break? (NY Times)
- Solar can provide 22 percent world’s power by 2050: IEA (Reuters)
- Venezuela Offshore Rig Sinks: Venezuelan energy officials said that the sunken natural gas rig posed no environment threat and that no workers had died. The cause of the sinking was unclear. (NY Times)
- Exxon CEO Whines About Push To Cut Big Oil’s Subsidies, After Making $6.3 Billion Last Quarter (Wonk Room)
- Another plastics ingredient raises safety concerns: Bisphenol A’s ‘twin’ may have more potent hormone effects (Science News)
- N.M. Salt Beds Could Become Nation’s Nuclear Dump (NPR)
- For Summer Sentinels, a Firefly Count (NY Times)
We here in PA have an environmental disaster in the making, playing out in slow motion, in the Marcellus Shale Gas play.
As Marybeth Kuznick clearly stated, PA is broke. The departments designated to enforce state oversight and enforcement are severely undermanned.
Big energy is taking advantage of the week upstate PA economies to get normally environmentally conscious landowners to sign away mineral rights for big one-time paydays.
But the drillers are acting in bad faith with the toxic waste they extract from each well. 25 years from now, God’s Country (as potter county is known) will be a toxic industrial waste land with 10-20 thousand well sites poisoned by spills, denuded of all vegetation and leaching their horrific waste into the water table.
Can you please push two important videos to the readers here. We need help and we need it YESTERDAY!
Endocrine Disruption:
http://www.endocrinedisruption....ideoplayer.php
Gasland:
http://www.gaslandthemovie.com/
Texas, Wyoming, Colorado…EVERYWHERE they’ve done this horizontal frac’ing they’ve poisoned the environment. EVERYWHERE. And the net benefit to America is practically nill. The gas extracted is sold on the open market at going rates and is often bought and shipped overseas.
It’s a huge, horrific lie. And we’ve got to stop it.
Yep, Dan in PA, the environmental consequences of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking” (apt double entendre for Battlestar Galactica fans) are staggering, yet mostly unknown to the vast majority of Americans.
See Pro Publica’s excellent ongoing comprehensive investigative series on this under-reported story.
It seems as though PA residents just see the dollar signs for the most part.
But I wonder how the people of Dimock feel about fracking now?
The oil spill is appalling beyond measure. One of the appalling aspects is the sheer waste of all those billions of gallons of oil.
Shouldn’t every out-of-work fisherman and fishing boat and every idle member of the National Guard, the Coast Guard, any unemployed person who doesn’t get seasick be out there recovering some of that crude?
Oil and water don’t mix. I would think some ingenious type could rig up some kind of crude huge centrifuge for spinning quantities of oil-contaminated seawater and siphoning off the oil.
Or do something! I don’t even care if it isn’t practical. Put our best minds to it, and pour even a fraction of the resources into it that we are bleeding into Iraq and Afghanistan and maybe, eventually, we could come up with something. But at least let’s make a start!
Bill BP for it later.
Frankly, I have no issue with those who call this Obama’s Katrina. Indeed he’s doing a heckuva job on it so far.
Yep, Lora, the whole disaster in the Gulf is made that much more sickening because it was wholly & completely preventable. One can only hope the right heads will roll, and that EVERYONE contacts their representatives in Congress to respond appropriately. This madness must stop.