With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen
'Too Much Crazy!' Edition...
By Desi Doyen on 4/7/2011, 1:34pm PT  


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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: More U.S. Chamber of Commerce propaganda to support the GOP v. EPA in the House and Senate; Clean energy v. Oil in the budget shutdown showdown... PLUS: Signs of stabilizing at the Fukushima nuclear plant, as yet another earthquake rocks Japan's devastated coastline ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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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' (see links below): Climate change breaks NASA temperature chart; Dangerous new antibiotic-resistant water bug found in India; OK return to Dust Bowl days?; TX worsening drought devastating wheat crops; GOP allows agribusiness to dump pesticides in water; Solar Costs May Already Rival Coal; Canceled Coal Plant's Aging Parts; Right-wing Group Writes Anti-EPA Bills For State Legislatures; What corporations really mean by profit and loss; Should 'smart grid' let smart meters make decisions for consumers?; Clean-Energy Investment Is Placed at Risk as UN Climate Negotiations Stall; Governments urged to move forward at UN climate meeting; Two Major Enviro Groups Join Forces ... PLUS: Boom-and-bust fossil fuels and the promise of cheap electricity ....

STORIES DISCUSSED IN TODAY'S 'GREEN NEWS REPORT'...

'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (Stuff we didn't have time for in today's audio report)...

  • You're getting warmer: Climate change breaks NASA temperature chart (Climate Safety):
    The temperature anomaly in the Arctic --- the amount that current temperatures differ from historical norms --- is now so severe that NASA's James Hansen had to add a new color to his charts in order to accurately depict it: Hot pink.
  • Cardiff University-led team finds New Delhi antibiotic-resistant water bug (BBC):
    A Cardiff University-led team of scientists are urging urgent action by health authorities worldwide after it discovered new strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in India.

    It is the first time the bacteria, found in the drinking water supply of New Delhi, has been located in the wider environment outside a hospital.

  • Oklahoma Facing Drought Comparable To Dust Bowl Days (AP):
    Paul Fruendt said he's been farming for 25 years and he's never seen such bad growing conditions. His farm in Guthrie in central Oklahoma got a little rain, but he said his crops will still probably run out of water within a few weeks.

    "For us already, we're going to suffer," said Fruendt, who invested about $100,000 in his wheat. "Probably two-thirds of our gross income has been wiped out for the next six months."

  • Storms not enough to help Texas' worsening drought (AP):
    The area considered in an extreme drought has tripled in the past month, and weather forecasters expect the drought to continue or get worse through June in most of the state. That means the danger of fire will remain extremely high, National Weather Service meteorologist Victor Murphy said.

    "This could end up being one of the more devastating droughts, agriculturally speaking and for wildfires, if we don't start getting normal to above normal rainfall before June," Murphy said. "The odds of seeing that are likely below normal."

  • Anti-EPA House Votes To Let Agribusiness Dump Pesticides In Our Water (Think Progress) [emphasis added]:
    The Tea Party Congress doesn’t just hate EPA rules that protect against industry destroying our country with greenhouse pollution, mercury, coal ash, and mountaintop removal. By a veto-proof margin, the U.S. House of Representatives voted yesterday to prohibit Clean Water Act limits on pesticide pollution of lakes, streams, and rivers.

    Lobbyists for industrial agriculture polluters cheered the 292-130 vote for H.R. 872, which “will amend the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) and the Clean Water Act to clarify Congressional intent and eliminate the requirement for National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permits for applications of pesticides approved for use under FIFRA.”

  • Solar Costs May Already Rival Coal, Spurring Installation Boom (Bloomberg):
    Solar panel installations may surge in the next two years as the cost of generating electricity from the sun rivals coal-fueled plants, industry executives and analysts said.
  • Up For Sale: Canceled Coal Plant's Aging Parts (SolveClimate)
  • Right-wing Group Writes Anti-EPA Bills For State Legislatures (ClimateWire):
    A Virginia state lawmaker caused a stir in February when he admitted that his resolution declaring U.S. EPA's effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions a 'regulatory train wreck' was written by the coal industry.
  • Op-Ed: What corporations really mean by profit and loss: Despite 11 workers killed in the Deepwater Horizon disaster, TransOcean gave executives 'safety' bonuses. All too typical (Laura Flanders, Guardian UK)
  • 'Smart grid' entrepreneurs debate letting smart meters make decisions for consumers (Sustainable Industries)
  • Clean-Energy Investment Is Placed at Risk as UN Climate Negotiations Stall (Bloomberg)
  • Governments urged to tackle work agreed in 2010 at UN climate meeting (Engineering News) [emphasis added]:
    The first United Nations (UN) climate change negotiating session for 2011 started in Bangkok, Thailand, on Monday, and UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) executive secretary Christiana Figueres called on governments to tackle work agreed to in 2010 and address shortfalls in climate action to put the world on a climate-safe path.
    ...
    Figueres said that governments have two main tasks before them in 2011. The first relates to the emission reduction targets and actions, which would keep the world from breaching the 2 ºC average temperature rise, by the end of the century, as agreed in Cancun.

    The sum of national promises to date equals only about 60% of what science requires by 2020 to stay below the agreed 2 ºC goal.

  • Two Major Enviro Groups Join Forces: McKibben and Taylor on the merger of 350.org and 1Sky (Climate Progress)
  • Boom-and-bust fossil fuels and the promise of cheap electricity (Grist):
    Solar hot water heating took off at the turn of the century but fizzled around 1930 when natural gas became cheap.
    ...
    The crazy thing about human beings is that we build infrastructure around the low price, not the high price. We get locked in to that infrastructure and it's difficult for other technologies to break in. You've already invested in your HVAC system for your 4,000-square-foot house 50 miles from the nearest city. How do you design a solar system for that house, or an electric car that's going to fit your needs? It's a tough thing.
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