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Archive for February, 2015
Interior Secretary vows to work on solutions for climate-threatened village
Posted by Anchorage Daily News: None Given on February 17th, 2015
Anchorage Daily News: In a whirlwind visit to Northwest Alaska on an unseasonably warm day, U.S. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell on Monday told residents of this climate-threatened village that she would work with them on their relocation efforts.
Jewell is in the Arctic region at the invitation of the Alaska Federation of Natives. The state’s most powerful Native organization had organized a retreat in the hub city of Kotzebue for its 37-member board and wanted Jewell to address climate change and other issues affecting...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Interior Secretary vows to work on solutions for climate-threatened villageScientists sound storm warning on African climate change
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 17th, 2015
Agence France-Presse: On a typical February day in West Africa, Cape Verdeans are taking time to cool down as the island nation is buffeted by a rare unseasonal downpour. For the scientists gathered in the archipelago’s capital Praia, however, the rain is a worrying portent of the changing climate to which Africa is becoming increasingly vulnerable. With each new decade the continent is witnessing more droughts, heatwaves and deadly floods like those that overwhelmed Malawi and Mozambique in January, according to experts...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Scientists sound storm warning on African climate changeOil Train Derailments Renew Questions About Safety
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 17th, 2015
LA Times: The derailments this week of two trains carrying crude oil have raised new questions about the adequacy of federal efforts to improve the safety of moving oil on tank cars from new North American wells to distant refineries.
A 100-car, southbound CSX train derailed Monday in a West Virginia river valley, destroying a home and possibly contaminating the water supply for downriver residents. A thundering fireball rose hundreds of feet above the community amid an intense winter storm.
Back-to-back...
State Officials Misrepresent North Dakota’s Spill Problem
Posted by Inside Energy: None Given on February 17th, 2015
Inside Energy: On a muggy day in August, Daryl and Christine Peterson spent hours driving me along gravel roads through farmland damaged by wastewater spills in Bottineau County, North Dakota. Just south of the Canadian border in the central part of the state, Bottineau has been producing oil for decades, but has largely been left out of the state's most recent boom. Now, rusty pumpjacks and tanks rise above a green quilt of soybeans and wheat.
Daryl Peterson stopped the truck in the middle of a field. In front...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on State Officials Misrepresent North Dakota’s Spill Problem‘Anti-Petroleum’ Movement Growing Security Threat to Canada, RCMP Say
Posted by Globe & Mail: None Given on February 17th, 2015
Globe & Mail: The RCMP has labelled the "anti-petroleum" movement as a growing and violent threat to Canada's security, raising fears among environmentalists that they face increased surveillance, and possibly worse, under the Harper government's new terrorism legislation.
In highly charged language that reflects the government's hostility toward environmental activists, an RCMP intelligence assessment warns that foreign-funded groups are bent on blocking oil sands expansion and pipeline construction, and that...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on ‘Anti-Petroleum’ Movement Growing Security Threat to Canada, RCMP SayOklahoma’s Daily Small Quakes Raise Risk of Big Ones, Study Says
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 17th, 2015
Associated Press: Small earthquakes shaking Oklahoma and southern Kansas daily and linked to energy drilling are dramatically increasing the chance of bigger and dangerous quakes, federal research indicates.
This once stable region is now just as likely to see serious damaging and potentially harmful earthquakes as the highest risk places east of the Rockies such as New Madrid, Missouri, and Charleston, South Carolina, which had major quakes in the past two centuries.
Still it's a low risk, about a 1 in 2,500...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Oklahoma’s Daily Small Quakes Raise Risk of Big Ones, Study SaysExtent of Stealth Fracking in Gulf of Mexico Revealed
Posted by Al Jazeera: None Given on February 17th, 2015
Al Jazeera: While a debate rages over the use of hydraulic fracturing to exploit fossil fuel reserves inland, the practice has quietly taken hold offshore, in the Gulf of Mexico.
Documents obtained by “Fault Lines” reveal that the world’s largest oil firms are now fracking in some of the Gulf’s deepest waters -- raising questions about how it is being regulated.
A list of about 100 well sites offers one of the first snapshots of the practice, which until just a couple years ago was unknown to the public....
Icy storm paralyzes central US, pummels nation’s capital
Posted by Reuters: Elizabeth Barber on February 17th, 2015
Reuters: Record-breaking cold gripped the eastern United States while an icy winter storm crippled the nation's central states and then plowed into the mid-Atlantic, dumping snow and forcing federal offices in Washington, D.C. to close on Tuesday.
Heavy snowfall and ice moving eastward from the Southern Plains pounded Missouri, Arkansas, southern Illinois, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio, the National Weather Service said.
With the storm headed east and sleet and freezing rain expected to also...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Icy storm paralyzes central US, pummels nation’s capitalTaps Start to Run Dry in Brazil Largest City
Posted by New York Times: Simon Romero on February 16th, 2015
New York Times: Endowed with the Amazon and other mighty rivers, an array of huge dams and one-eighth of the world’s fresh water, Brazil is sometimes called the “Saudi Arabia of water,” so rich in the coveted resource that some liken it to living above a sea of oil. But in Brazil’s largest and wealthiest city, a more dystopian situation is unfolding: the taps are starting to run dry. As southeast Brazil grapples with its worst drought in nearly a century, a problem worsened by polluted rivers, deforestation and...
7 Reasons to Drinking Plenty of Water
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on February 16th, 2015
EcoWatch: Our bodies are around 60 percent water, give or take.
It is commonly recommended to drink eight 8-ounce glasses of water per day (the 8×8 rule).
Although there is little science behind this specific rule, staying hydrated is important.
Here are seven evidence-based health benefits of drinking plenty of water.
1. Water Helps to Maximize Physical Performance
If we do not stay hydrated, physical performance can suffer.
This is particularly important during intense exercise or high...