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Archive for January, 2014
Keystone Foes Say Two Pipelines Are Worse Than One
Posted by Bloomberg: Mark Drajem on January 30th, 2014
Bloomberg: Opponents of Keystone XL now want to block its construction by showing that two oil pipelines from Canada to the U.S. are worse than one.
The Sierra Club said TransCanada Corp.’s (TRP) Keystone and the proposed expansion of Enbridge Inc.’s (ENB) Alberta Clipper should be reviewed together to account for how the combination would contribute to climate change. The San Francisco-based environmental group filed a petition today with 15 other groups, asking the U.S. State Department to revise its Keystone...
Tests Said to Find Formaldehyde in West Virginia Tap Water
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 30th, 2014
New York Times: Tests on the water supply in Charleston, W. Va., a week after a chemical spill tainted the city’s water system turned up traces of formaldehyde, suggesting that “there’s a lot more we don’t know” about the consequences of the spill, an environmental expert told a state legislative committee on Wednesday. That expert, Scott Simonton, a member of the state’s Environmental Quality Board, told the panel that he could guarantee that some West Virginians were breathing formaldehyde gas when they showered,...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Tests Said to Find Formaldehyde in West Virginia Tap WaterLess Snow Threatens Antarctica’s Fragile Ice Shelves
Posted by LiveScience: Becky Oskin on January 30th, 2014
LiveScience: Antarctica's summer meltwater ponds are beautiful killers. Given an escape route down to the ice, the sapphire-blue water jacks open fractures and crevasses in ice shelves, breaking them apart.
Most ice shelves -- floating, frozen plateaus permanently attached to the shore -- have a thick blanket of snow that protects them from meltwater. The snow soaks up water like a sponge. But climate change may soon transform these downy snow blankets into threadbare sheets, putting more ice shelves in the...
Hawaii lawmakers move to block local bans on GMOs, pesticides
Posted by Grist: None Given on January 29th, 2014
Grist: Late last year, the Kauai and Hawaii County councils passed laws restricting the use of pesticides and experimental GMOs on their slices of Hawaiian paradise. But those laws could soon be sunk by state lawmakers.
Hawaii County`s rules ban biotech giants from the island and prohibit the new planting of GMO crops (farmers who already grow GMO crops may continue doing so). Kauai`s rules require disclosures from anyone growing GMOs or spraying agricultural pesticides and the creation of pesticide-free...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Hawaii lawmakers move to block local bans on GMOs, pesticidesIndustry in North Dakota Promises Reduce Flared Natural Gas
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2014
New York Times: Faced with growing criticism and lawsuits, an oil industry task force representing hundreds of companies in North Dakota pledged on Wednesday to make an all-out effort to capture almost all the natural gas that is being flared in the Bakken shale oil field by the end of the decade. The gas being flared as a byproduct of a rush of oil drilling releases roughly six million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year, roughly equivalent to three medium-sized coal plants. Because of a lack...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Industry in North Dakota Promises Reduce Flared Natural GasAsian Carp Invasion Barriers Evaluated in New Great Lakes Study
Posted by Nature World: James A. Foley on January 29th, 2014
Nature World: Asian carp pose a major risk to water ecosystems in North America and wildlife managers have been struggling to keep the invasive species from spreading unmitigated throughout continental waterways.
A new study by the University of Notre Dame, Resources for the Future, and the US Forest Service documents the various barriers available for Asian carp prevention and assesses the effectiveness of each one.
While previous studies have assessed the pros and cons of different Asian carp management...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Asian Carp Invasion Barriers Evaluated in New Great Lakes StudyPete Seeger’s greatest legacy? Saving New York’s Hudson river
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2014
Guardian: Pete Seeger's greatest legacy after a long life filled with music and activism may have been saving the Hudson river, according to those who worked with him to save the waterway.
“The Hudson was saved by a lot of people,” said Robert Kennedy Jr, who has sued industry for polluting the river as an environmental lawyer for the Waterkeeper Alliance. He said he had known Seeger for 30 years.
“But for a lot of us, Pete was the first guy. He started the train, and we all jumped on the moving train.”...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Pete Seeger’s greatest legacy? Saving New York’s Hudson riverHow Industrial Chemical Regulation Failed West Virginia
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2014
National Public Radio: On Jan. 9, people in and around Charleston, W.Va., began showing up at hospitals: They had nausea, eye infections and some were vomiting. It was later discovered that around 10,000 gallons of toxic chemicals had leaked into the Elk River, just upstream from a water treatment plant that serves 300,000 people. Citizens were told not to drink or bathe in the water, and while some people are now using water from their taps, many still don't trust it or the information coming from public officials.
Charleston...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on How Industrial Chemical Regulation Failed West VirginiaClimate Change is Already Causing Mass Human Migration
Posted by Smithsonian: Colin Schultz on January 29th, 2014
Smithsonian: There are a lot of reasons people move:for work, for love, for the draw of the big city or the quiet of nature. But as the world continues to warm, it's expected that global climate change will become another factor driving people to move:to dodge coastal erosion and sea level rise, to follow changes in rainfall, to avoid strengthening storms. Climate change is already inducing marine animals to migrate, and according to a new study published in the journal Nature Climate Change, it's starting to...
Pre-competitive collaboration key solving water risks in Kenya
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2014
Guardian: For most companies, competing comes more naturally than collaborating. Why would you work the people you spend most of your time trying to wrestle market share from?
But increasingly, businesses find they are fighting for more than customers – they are also competing for, or at least having to share, finite natural resources. And not just with each other, but with other users, such as governments, local communities and farmers.
This is the situation that has Diageo found itself in regarding...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Pre-competitive collaboration key solving water risks in Kenya