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Archive for November, 2013
Huge Election Victories for Colorado’s Anti-Fracking Movement
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on November 6th, 2013
EcoWatch: Yesterday`s election brought huge results for anti-fracking voters in Fort Collins, Boulder and Lafayette where all measures were approved that will either ban or pause the practice of hydraulic fracturing. Initial results show Broomfield with a tally so close--13 votes--that it will force a recount.
"With wins in Boulder, Lafayette and Fort Collins--and a partial-victory in Broomfield--this election sends a huge wake-up call to Governor Hickenlooper that the people of Colorado do not want to...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Huge Election Victories for Colorado’s Anti-Fracking MovementGreen alert flares after McCarthy’s comments on Keystone XL, fracking
Posted by ClimateWire: Elana Schor on November 6th, 2013
ClimateWire: A Boston Globe reporter yesterday alarmed environmentalists with a preview of his interview with U.S. EPA chief Gina McCarthy that indicated she has an open attitude about the Keystone XL pipeline and hydraulic fracturing.
The McCarthy quotes tweeted by the Globe's David Abel at 1 p.m. -- she "didn't buy the argument that blocking the Keystone pipeline would prevent the extraction of tar sands oil," he wrote -- caused a conflagration big enough that EPA spokeswoman Alisha Johnson threw cold water...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Green alert flares after McCarthy’s comments on Keystone XL, frackingAnti-fracking measures win in three Colorado cities
Posted by Daily Camera: John Aguilar on November 6th, 2013
Daily Camera: Aversion to the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing was confirmed this afternoon as final election results showed voters in three cities along the Front Range -- including Boulder and Lafayette -- approving a halt to the energy extraction method within their borders.
In Broomfield, the only other city to have a fracking ban on the ballot, the issue was failing by a mere 13 votes out of more than 20,000 cast, according to unofficial final results released this morning by the Broomfield...
Colorado an energy battleground as towns ban fracking
Posted by Reuters: Keith Coffman on November 6th, 2013
Reuters: Three Colorado cities have rejected oil and gas production work that relies on so-called fracking, unofficial election returns showed on Wednesday in a setback for an industry that won other battles this year in Democratic strongholds like California.
Boulder, Lafayette and Fort Collins passed measures with solid margins to suspend or ban the technique formally known as hydraulic fracturing. But a fourth community, Broomfield, about 12 miles (19 km) east of Boulder, narrowly rejected a fracking...
Climate change is decreasing farm yields just when we need them to go up
Posted by Grist: None Given on November 6th, 2013
Grist: One of the most disturbing details included in the recently leaked IPCC report is that climate change could begin reducing farm yields worldwide by up to 2 percent a decade. Meanwhile, demand for crops is increasing 12 percent per decade.
You don’t have to be a math whiz to see how that (doesn`t) add up.
A collision between a rising need for food and falling yields would be terrible for the environment, as well as for people. When people are starving, they are forced to make really bad tradeoffs:...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Climate change is decreasing farm yields just when we need them to go upNeed for Keystone XL Erodes as U.S. Oil Floods Gulf Coast Refining Hub
Posted by InsideClimate: Elizabeth Douglass on November 6th, 2013
InsideClimate: The ongoing U.S. oil boom has flooded the Gulf Coast with domestic crude to levels not seen in decades, creating a homegrown oil glut in the nation's refining center just as the Obama Administration prepares to rule on a pipeline that would add a torrent of heavy Canadian crude to the same region. It's just the latest in a string of developments that have surprised and roiled oil markets since 2009, when the combination of falling fuel demand and an unexpected surge in U.S. oil and natural gas production...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Need for Keystone XL Erodes as U.S. Oil Floods Gulf Coast Refining HubUnited Kingdom: Government ‘action’ on water bills amounts to no more than begging
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 6th, 2013
Guardian: Spooked by the beating the government is taking over soaring energy bills, prime minister David Cameron's spokesman last week trailed "action" on another fast rising utility cost: water bills.
"The prime minister wants to see household costs across the piece being reduced as low as possible. The intention is to try to reduce the burdens on hard-pressed families. There will be some action next week from the department of environment, food and rural affairs with the intention of looking at water...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on United Kingdom: Government ‘action’ on water bills amounts to no more than beggingCarbon credit scam firms closed
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 6th, 2013
Press Association: More than a dozen companies that "preyed on older people" through carbon credit scams have been closed by the industry's regulator, a minister has announced.
Consumer Minister Jo Swinson said the offending companies carried out a particularly contemptible scam
More than a dozen companies that "preyed on older people" through carbon credit scams have been closed by the industry's regulator, a minister has announced.
Nineteen firms that attracted investments of nearly £24m from more than 1,500...
Fracking Is “the Biggest Boom Since the Housing Bubble”: Will It End the Same Way?
Posted by Daily Ticker: Bernice Napach on November 6th, 2013
Daily Ticker: Forty years after the Arab oil embargo, the U.S. has become the world's largest oil and gas producer. This is largely the result of fracking, the shortened name for hydraulic fracturing, which uses water and chemicals injected into rock at very high pressures to release the oil and gas embedded within. Recent advances in this decades-old method of drilling have produced more oil and gas in the U.S. than most thought possible.
"Fracking is the biggest boom since the housing bubble...and even maybe...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Fracking Is “the Biggest Boom Since the Housing Bubble”: Will It End the Same Way?Australia: Shoppers warned: food prices may not fall when carbon tax is scrapped
Posted by Guardian: And Electricity Providers Say They Cannot Guarantee Tony Abbott's Promise That D on November 6th, 2013
Guardian: Food and grocery prices may not fall when the carbon tax is repealed and struggling food manufacturers could be forced to continue to pay the tax in their power bills for 18 months after compensation schemes offered by the former Labor government had been abolished.
The warning, from the Australian Food and Grocery Council, comes after cautions from electricity generators and retailers that they can't guarantee domestic power bills will fall by Tony Abbott's promised 9% and from the Australian...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Australia: Shoppers warned: food prices may not fall when carbon tax is scrapped