CF / Deadly Pursuit of Extreme Oil
Raping the Planet: Strip mining at Fort McMurray. Greenpeace / Colin O'Connor
The end of easy oil is over. From now on, all the oil we use will be difficult to obtain. So, since renewable fuels are available to us, it follows that we should be working hard to get off fossil fuels. Instead we are cleaning up the mess that more oil has created and planning to get even more difficult-to-obtain oil. This is not just unnecessary — it’s dangerous and stupid.
This is a recording of a very interesting and timely presentation that puts our use of oil in perspective, by expert, author and Hampshire College professor Michael Klare. He talks about the follies and dangers of our unwavering pursuit of extreme energy and describes the geopolitics of the energy crisis.
Oil is now actually “extreme energy” and unconventional rather than normal, because we are now getting it out of shale, from under miles of ocean water, and from tar sands in Canada, for example. It’s become “extreme oil”. We have passed peak oil, so oil is no longer readily available except by these extreme measures of extraction that push the very edges of what is possible. And while they are pushing those edges, some of the very nastiest environmental degradation and pollution is taking place. As a result, the Gulf of Mexico may have a permanent “dead zone” far bigger than anything imagined in the past, and it may not be cleaned up for a century. Is this really what we want to do to our planet for a little bit of energy that we will burn tomorrow and then it’s gone forever? It’s time to say No to fossil fuels and move on to something that makes more sense. Pursuit of extreme oil is a terrible government strategy.
Michael Klare’s entire talk can be downloaded here. Watch, if you want to see the slides, from here.
Klare’s latest book is Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet.
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Climate Files 62 / EPA Priorities
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson Discusses 2010 EPA Priorities
On March 8, 2010, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson spoke to the National Press Club on progress made by the agency in 2009 and priorities for 2010. She discussed actions on climate change, America’s waters and EPA’s efforts to expand the conversation on environmentalism.
She was asked why the EPA doesn’t stop surface mining (mountaintop removal) and she basically said because the EPA regulates pollution and water quality; the EPA does not and cannot regulate mining. That is a political excuse. They are the Environmental Protection Agency — it’s their job to protect the environment. Mountaintop removal is one of the most environmentally destructive practices in the U.S. and they must have the authority to stop it. Apparently, this is the EPA’s way of stalling a decision on mountaintop removal. Surface coal mining is especially destructive, not just to our water but to the trees, the ecology of the area, and to the land itself. There is no way to put the top back on a hill or mountain once it has been removed, and no way to completely reinstate the wildlife and balance of the ecology of the area once it has been ruined.
Unfortunately today, in conjunction with this talk, the EPA approved a surface mining operation in Ohio. They imposed supposed stringent rules on the mining operation so that it doesn’t pollute the water, but nowhere are there requirements of a carbon fee or any way for this mining to take responsibility for how it adds to global warming. This is where the EPA has to change. The EPA’s responsibilities should include protecting the human race’s ability to live in its environment–which would necessarily render coal mining obsolete. Read about the EPA’s new permit below. To see the video of this talk, visit CSPAN.org.
Below is the press release released by the EPA today in its approval of the Ohio surface mining permit. This is a blow to the environment, and it’s hard to see how this is the EPA “protecting” the country’s land and water.
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Climate Files 61 / Question the EPA
I attended the EPA Townhall Meeting and asked a good question. Everyone should question the EPA. Mine was about that nasty Canadian tar sands oil and the pipeline that is spilling oil into the beautiful northern part of one of the Great Lakes states. The EPA must not care very much about that, because they wouldn’t answer a simple question: how does a dirty oil pipeline fit in with the new green economy being promoted in the Great Lakes states? I like this EPA so much better than the last one, but it’s hard to believe it’s so easy to stump the EPA.
Also in this episode, what U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders said about climate change deniers, and what President Obama said about energy and climate in his speech to the business roundtable in Washington DC. Some headlines were covered too, including the exciting news about Bloom Energy, a new company making a revolutionary new type of stand-alone power station. It sounds almost too good to be true — fuel cells that run on oxygen and biomass? Yes, and it’s already being used by companies in Silicon Valley. Here is what I wrote about it on Futurism Now.
The Delta Institute website is here.
The EPA video page where you can watch the entire Townhall meeting from February 23rd is here.
News covered:
- Poor Nations Could Be Paid to Preserve Marine CO2: UN (Reuters)
- Curbing Smokestack Emissions Tops EPA’s 2011-2013 Enforcement Goals (Greenwire)
- Groups ID Toxic Coal Ash Sites in 14 States, Demand Regulations (ENN)
- Tackling Climate Change ‘Urgent,’ President Hu Jintao Says (China Daily)
- Italy Delays New Solar Plan Again, Industry Worried
- World’s Temperature Record To Be Re-analyzed (The Independent)
- Check out the Enbridge Pipeline in my Backyard blog.
- Waste could fuel part of Spain – read here.
- Did you hear about the 126,000 gallon oil spill in northern MN, the 2nd in months?
You can download this episode here, or subscribe on Climate Files Radio.
Final song is by Galactic, “Heart of Steel feat. Irma Thomas” from the MPR song of the day podcast.
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Climate Files 57 / Hacking the Climate
Mt. Pinatubo erupting in 1991
In his State of the Union Speech Obama last week, President Obama focused on Nukes, Offshore Drilling and Biofuels. A lot of people were bothered that he didn’t focus more on renewables. It seems that we can’t depend on the U.S. government to come to the rescue of the climate because they aren’t communicating the danger of climate change and they aren’t talking about how to stop it. In fact, they are mostly talking about jobs and the economy. So that leaves us with the same climate crisis we started with before the last election.
Ross Gelbspan is an author (his website here) and journalist who feels that it’s already too late to stop climate change. Based on his 15 years of research, he has released a recent video that tells us we need to act now and plan to adapt and survive. According to Gelbspan,
As the pace of global warming kicks into overdrive, the hollow optimism of climate activists, along with the desperate responses of some of the world’s most prominent climate scientists, are preventing us from focusing on the survival requirements of the human enterprise.
This brings up the idea of using geoengineering to help in a climate emergency. People involved in geoengineering research stress that it’s not a substitute for mitigating carbon emissions but that it’s tool of last resort. The question is, what kind of tool will it be, how can it be safely tested, and who should be making these decisions. They emphasize this is not a substitute for mitigation. Whether you think it’s good or bad, the research is expanding and growing right now.
CDR (carbon dioxide removal) and SRM (solar radiation management) are discussed in this episode according to recent articles in the journal Science. (Articles here and here). What are the risks of solar radiation management actions, which scientists feel would be potentially dangerous?
Bill Gates has been writing about climate change lately, and he’s putting his money where his keyboard is. He’s investing in stopping hurricanes with his new patent and is talking about what our climate change targets should be. (more info after the break)
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Climate Files 49 / The Climate Olympics Begin
The Copenhagen climate summit COP15 has begun, and it seems like most of the world is there.
That’s the biggest news. Coinciding with that, the EPA has passed an endangerment finding under the Clean Air Act. Could we ask for anything more? Yes, a binding legal treaty to reduce emissions, in Copenhagen. That’s what we really need. But now we know that if Congress doesn’t act on climate change legislation quickly enough, the EPA now has an obligation to regulate or otherwise stop harmful GHG emissions from hurting the health of Americans.
The finding was time to strengthen the U.S. negotiating position in Copenhagen. Good for them. In this episode you can hear two introductory press conferences on days 1 and 2 of the climate conference and also the U.S. delegate, John Pershing, stating the U.S.’s preliminary positions. They all also smack down the climate scientist emails that were illegally obtained, stating that it just won’t make any difference. There is an enormous amount of scientific data in the U.S. and from all over the world that has been independently arrived at and supports global warming claims. Watch the EPA announcement video here and you can download the Finding’s segments there too.
The mysterious Danish Text story.
LinkTV climate change videos are here.
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Climate Files 47 / Are We Lemmings?
Are we climate lemmings?
It was announced this morning that President Obama will attend the climate summit in Copenhagen, and he also announced his emissions targets: in the range of 17% by 2020. This is great news! It’s also bad news. Is this the best America can do? This response to climate change is not adequate for the U.S. when other countries are doing more. There is a phenomenon at work here. Two recordings in this episode address expectations at Copenhagen and why people believe what they believe about global warming, and how to possibly change how the public thinks about it. Maybe we can even influence our politicians.
Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), speaks with correspondent Miles Benson in an interview from Earth Focus, discussing UNEP’s sobering recent report that says we will feel the consequences of climate change soon. Are we lemmings, or why don’t we act more decisively on this issue?
The public opinion talk is from the American Meteorological Society, from an Environmental sciences Seminar Series, and it’s on Public Attitudes, Perceptions, and Concerns about Global Warming, evidence from a survey. This survey is not new, it’s actually from late last year. It was presented in Washington DC by Jon Krosnick, PH.D., Stanford University.
The Krosnick talk has been split into two parts and this episode contains the first part. If you want to hear part two and an additional talk by Jon Krosnick you can find that here.
Are we lemmings refers to a question Achim Steiner was asked during his interview. It doesn’t mean we don’t believe in global warming, (75% of Americans do, down from 85% of 3 years ago) it refers to the fact that Americans don’t want to change the status quo or make lifestyle changes unless everyone else in the world does it first.
Other news discussed: Chris Hedges wrote: Refuse Allegiance to Coal. Read it here.
More news: Latest Science Shows Climate Change Outpacing Previous Projections
United Nations program on Climate change is here. The Climate Change Science Compendium is on this page.
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Climate Files 45 / Peak Oil and IEA Report
The new 2009 World Energy Report shows a decline in oil, but did the U.S. interfere in the final report to avoid a panic in the markets? The IEA denies the pressure.
Many experts think Saudi Arabia and other countries are inflating the numbers reflecting what oil they have left.
This was NaPodPoMo episode 11 of the November podcast marathon. (FN is now ending its involvement in NaPodPoMo.)
Many energy experts also think we have started peak oil already, and everything from here on is a decline. Worse, the US doesn’t want anyone else to know this, and has pressured the IEA to soften its language on peak oil and oil decline to prevent panic.
The November 10 IEA press release is here. Story about U.S. pressure on the IEA from The Guardian is here. The IEA has denied the claims that appeared in the Guardian from the anonymous whistleblowers. You can read what they said here.
The IEA book site is here, and here are the available downloads of the World Energy Report 2009.
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Climate Files 44 / Green News & Gore Fest
Dust Storm in Baghdad
LinkTV has a new weekly climate change video here and will appear on FN’s news website every week also.
I went to a talk tonight given by Sami Rasouli . . . He’s an Iraqi-American who has been a peace activist for Iraq and he recently returned from a trip to Iraq. One thing he talked about was the environmental disasters now in Iraq, how they have come about because of the war. The water in their rivers is so polluted, they can’t drink it, and they can’t eat the fish either, because the fish have been eating the dead bodies thrown in the river. Because the dirt has been ground to such a fine powder, they are having dust storms twice a week now. Other topics covered include the activist movement, Al Gore’s opinion on climate change Obama, that Obama might go to Copenhagen in December (and he should), and the UK wind sector has gotten a big infusion of money.
Massachusetts rethinks using its forests for “renewable energy.”
This and more news in this episode of the 10th installment of the podcasting marathon known as NaPodPoMo. Read about the EPA Fish Study revealing widespread contamination here.
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Climate Files 43 / Rethink Meat
Flame-broiled Doom
Meat consumption might be destroying the planet and killing us. It’s certainly not green, so maybe we should think about it more before using it so much. And Americans consume more meat than anyone on the planet. It’s contributing to climate change, to terrible environmental practices, pollution and our inability to feed everyone on earth adequately. When people are starving they don’t want meat, they want food.
A few tangents were taken in this episode, namely, Mike the Headless Chicken, whose story you can read here.
Jonathan Safran Foer recently wrote Eating Animals and was recently on NPR talking about his book. He explains his point of view in a short interview you can hear in this episode.
Facts about climate change and meat consumption, including the possibility that it causes health problems, here and here. The doctor’s site that claims red meat can cause breast cancer is here.
My Futurism prediction: In 50 years or less it will be abnormal and rare to find anyone, anywhere, eating meat.
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Climate Files 34 / Send Obama to Copenhagen with Climate Plan
Climate Action Day for 350 ppm
President Obama gave an energy speech at MIT in Massachusetts on October 23rd, which you will hear in this episode. He announced some interesting things that MIT students are working on in terms of new energy. He also said the US is in a peaceful competition to develop clean technologies, and he championed US leadership on clean energy, as international deadlines for climate change mitigation loom.
In this episode, you will also hear Australian scientist Tim Flannery plead with Americans to pass climate legislation, and then hear Lisa Jackson explain how the EPA is back in action. Flannery’s interview is from DemocracyNow.
Everyone is expecting Obama to show up in Copenhagen for the major climate summit in December. He needs some convincing to get there, however. Help send Obama to Copenhagen and call the White House. The White House number is (202) 456-1414. The latest news is that he isn’t going and we need to convince him to go to Copenhagen with a Climate plan, if not legislation, in hand.
Now, I’m not a big supporter of the cap and trade bill (Kerry-Boxer, or CEJAPA) because most analysts says it won’t do enough to stop or even slow down climate change enough to make a difference. But some experts and analysts say it will do just that. It’s hard to know who to believe. But it will be a first step on the road to a climate deal in Copenhagen, or COP15, which is a two week meeting on climate change in December.
Also check out the October 24 International Day of Climate Action, sponsored by 350.org. 350 ppm is the goal in Copenhagan.
Also on Friday, Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, released the text of the Chairman’s Mark of the CEJAPA bill (S. 1733). That’s from the EPW news release from late Friday (Oct. 23rd) night. (The full text of the Chairman’s Mark was here but is currently unavailable — check back later.) The main difference between this text and the draft of the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act released late last month is that it “specifies distribution of emissions allowances” (details here). Also, the EPA released its analysis of Boxer’s bill. (click here).
The PDA statement for a carbon price is here. The Stop Global Warming/Environmental Issues Organizing Team has been sifting through different legislative proposals in the House and Senate since late last year and they have decided to support direct carbon pricing, with revenue recycling as the best method for reducing carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere. Read the statement here. Music at end: Eve of Destruction rewritten and performed by New Millenium.
Related article: Mr. Obama, be tough on climate change.
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Climate Files 32 / Great Big Green Jobs Victory
This episode contains a recording from the Green for All conference call from October 5th. It was all about green jobs and there are some good solid ideas in this recording. We definitely need jobs in the United States. In September the U.S. lost over 230,000 jobs. Unemployment continues to grow and where ever you might be in the world, you probably don’t have a great economy either.
Green for All is a national organization working to build an inclusive green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty. Green For All’s mission according to their website is dedicated to improving the lives of all Americans through a clean energy economy. We work in collaboration with the business, government, labor, and grassroots communities to create and implement programs that increase quality jobs and opportunities in green industry – all while holding the most vulnerable people at the center of our agenda.
Green jobs are blue collar jobs, or that’s what the Senate bill allows for, but those aren’t jobs everyone wants or can do. That’s only one of the many problems with the Senate’s CEJAPA bill. It’s good there is money provided for a new green economy but we need much more devoted to that purpose.
Speakers during the call were Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, Green For All; Jason Walsh, policy director at Green for All; Mark Ayers, AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department; Madeline Janis, Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy and Jessy Tolkan, Energy Action Coalition.
Not talking about the seriousness of climate change would be impossible, so at the end there is a discussion of the implications of green jobs, a weak Senate bill that doesn’t really address climate change, and a recent article by Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org. His article is titled, A Timely Reminder of the Real Limits to Growth. The implication is that capitalism just won’t be the sustainable economy of the future because it can’t be.
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Music: “Who Knows” by Marion Black, and “Post Millennium Extinction Blues” by Living Things
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Climate Files 31 / Off to the Climate Races
The Senate climate bill has arrived! It’s called CEJAPA, an awful name. That stands for Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act. Let’s call it the Climate Bill or the Kerry-Boxer bill. It leaves a lot to be desired, because it’s still full of coal, and gas, and it’s also not even a cap and trade bill. They are leaving that up to the Finance Committee. Are you confused yet? I explain everything, with some help, in this episode. Basically, the bill isn’t finished, and they left it that way on purpose.
Some of the help in explaining it comes from USCAN and their great consolidation of environmental groups’ statements on this bill. USCAN’s site about the bill is here, and as for the climate bill itself, that is here in full (pdf). If you don’t want to read all 821 pages of it, see the summary here (pdf).
Also, the EPA Introduced New Rules to Regulate Greenhouse Gas Emissions already! They aren’t wasting time. Read about it here. The EPA also said all 79 pending MTR coal mining permits would lead to water pollution and need further review. I like this EPA!
The frightening news continues: A six-foot/two-meter sea level rise is inevitable no matter what we do. Still, it could be worse.
‘Runaway’ melt is occurring on the Antarctica, and Greenland ice sheets. Experts find more ‘pervasive, enduring’ thinning than previously realized.
That community I tell you about is here and that 2012 movie clip is here at Fancast. Not even climate change could be as bad as that disaster — or could it?
If you are interested in the Bangkok climate change talks on-demand webcasts, they are here.
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Music: The Cult, Rain, and at the end, Santogold, Lights Out
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