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Archive for March, 2014
A California board action threatens farm survival
Posted by Sacramento Bee: Jim O’Banion on March 9th, 2014
Sacramento Bee: The negative impacts of the dry water year will be multiplied many times over if a proposal by a state agency becomes reality. It would overturn water rights held by water districts for more than 100 years.
In this water-short year, the state Department of Water Resources and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation petitioned the State Water Resources Control Board for operational flexibility to move water through the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to protect fish and the Delta's environment.
The board's...
California drought-prone pattern forcing farmers to adapt
Posted by Chronicle: Carolyn Lochhead on March 9th, 2014
Chronicle: Shawn Coburn farms land that holds senior water rights to the giant Central Valley Project, rights that usually assure him water. Not this year. He already has decided to let his pomegranates die, abandon alfalfa and cut his tomato crop by half. He may not plant any row crops if the state water board follows through on its intention to slash deliveries to "protect human health and safety" from the effects of drought. Coburn, 45, says his ranch near Dos Palos (Merced County) is no water-guzzler....
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Comments Off on California drought-prone pattern forcing farmers to adaptCalifornia Democrats call for marijuana legalization, fracking ban
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 9th, 2014
LA Times: California Democrats on Sunday unanimously approved a platform that calls for the legalization of marijuana and an immediate ban on the oil-and-gas industry practice known as fracking.
There was no debate on the proposals, only cheers and then a voice vote at the Los Angeles Convention Center, where a few hundred delegates gathered on the final day of the state Democratic Party's annual convention.
On the marijuana issue, state Democrats "support the legalization, regulation and taxation of...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on California Democrats call for marijuana legalization, fracking banAction Alert: Demand Oil Exploration End in Congo’s Gorilla Rich Virunga National Park
Posted by Water Conservation Blog on March 9th, 2014
By EcolInternet's Rainforest Portal
TAKE ACTION HERE NOW!
It has been two years since EcoInternet first alerted the international community that SOCO International a London-listed oil company planned to explore for oil in Virunga National Park. Virunga is Africas oldest national park and an UNESCO World Heritage site; and is home to a large population of wild gorillas, many other important wildlife species, primary rainforest ecosystems, and forest-dependent communities. Our earlier protests together caused other companies considering oil exploration to pull out. And opposition is growing as WWF has embraced the campaign, successfully bringing the case to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Oil exploration in these globally vital rainforest ecosystems will further set a dangerous precedent that nowhere whether protected, or ecologically important is immune from oil industry destruction. It appears every last bit of Earth's large, wild and intact ecosystems will be sacrificed to industrial development to extend our dependence upon fossil fuel, and delay transition now to renewable energy sources ensuring abrupt run-away climate change and global ecosystem collapse.
Posted in Uncategorized Comments Off on Action Alert: Demand Oil Exploration End in Congo’s Gorilla Rich Virunga National ParkNext fracking controversy: In Midwest, a storm brews over ‘frac sand’
Posted by Monitor: None Given on March 9th, 2014
Monitor: Kyle Slaby bounds up the slope behind his house, stopping at the sandstone outcrop he hopes will save his family's farm. The Slabys grow corn and soybeans on the ridgeline above. But these days there's more money – a lot more – in mining the sand below. "A lot of people look on it as an extension of farming," Mr. Slaby says. "It's another crop you're harvesting." Sand has become a valuable – and deeply divisive – commodity in the upper Midwest. Hydraulic fracturing, a method of extraction also...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Next fracking controversy: In Midwest, a storm brews over ‘frac sand’Report: Oklahoma’s Most Powerful Earthquake Cause Determined
Posted by Weather Channel: None Given on March 9th, 2014
Weather Channel: One of Oklahoma's biggest man-made earthquakes, caused by fracking-linked wastewater injection, triggered an earthquake cascade that led to the damaging magnitude-5.7 Prague quake that struck on Nov. 6, 2011, a new study confirms.
The findings suggest that even small man-made earthquakes, such as those of just a magnitude 1 or magnitude 2, can trigger damaging quakes, said study co-author Elizabeth Cochran, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey.
"Even if wastewater injection only directly...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Report: Oklahoma’s Most Powerful Earthquake Cause DeterminedChina to toughen environment law, hold polluters accountable
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 9th, 2014
Reuters: China will toughen its environmental protection laws to target polluters, according to a high-level policy report released on Sunday, paving the way for possibly unlimited penalties for polluting and the suspension or shutdown of polluters.
The revised law would hold "polluters accountable for the damage they cause and having them compensate for it", said the report, delivered by Zhang Dejiang, who sits on the seven-member Politburo Standing Committee as one of the country's most powerful politicians....
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on China to toughen environment law, hold polluters accountableUnited Kingdom: Like a lamb to slaughter: Environmentalist attacks ‘ecological disaster’ of sheep-rearing
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 9th, 2014
Independent: Its stark beauty may have inspired romantic poets Wordsworth and Coleridge, but for environmentalist George Monbiot, the Lake District has been turned by centuries of sheep-farming into something akin to a "chemical desert".
And so the controversial environmentalist could be forgiven for feeling a bit like Daniel in the lion's den as he took his message of "rewilding" the countryside to a hostile audience of about 100 stony-faced Cumbrian hill farmers.
In his most recent book, Feral: Searching...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on United Kingdom: Like a lamb to slaughter: Environmentalist attacks ‘ecological disaster’ of sheep-rearingGov. Jerry Brown heckled by protesters opposed to fracking
Posted by Chronicle: Carla Marinucci on March 8th, 2014
Chronicle: Gov. Jerry Brown faced protests at the state Democratic Party convention Saturday from crowds of progressives opposed to fracking, even as he attempted to make the case that California has led the country on climate change and renewable energy issues.
"The challenge facing California is not just drought today; it's climate change, now and forever," said Brown, as dozens of party activists holding "Another Democrat Against Fracking" signs rushed to the front of the hall and stood in their seats...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Gov. Jerry Brown heckled by protesters opposed to frackingStudy: Housing developments near drying forests a deadly combination in the West
Posted by Washington Post: Darryl Fears on March 8th, 2014
Washington Post: As the climate warms, forest fires in the West increasingly will feast on acres of dry brush, growing into giants. In a cycle that will become routine, homeowners will flee, while firefighters will rush toward their houses -- and away from areas where they could be putting out wildfires.
Bigger, unwiedly burns -- megafires -- are becoming the new normal, according to a new report, which points to several reasons: States such as California are getting parched more frequently by drought; housing...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Study: Housing developments near drying forests a deadly combination in the West