Tag Archives: department of interior

Trump’s ‘Salute to America’ will cost the National Parks Service $2.5 million

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Trump’s ‘Salute to America’ will cost the National Parks Service $2.5 million

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Trump’s ‘Budget for a better America’ means worse climate change

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It’s budget day, and, well, oy vey. President Trump unveiled his “Budget for a Better America” Monday — and it’s giving everyone a serious case of déjà vu.

To the surprise of no one, Trump’s proposed budget would take an ax to many domestic programs — $650 million in programs and activities compared to current funding levels — including several environmental and energy-related activities. The total cost of programs that would be slashed is in the billions, but much of it is countered by a major boost to national security spending.

After Congress told Trump he couldn’t have for $5.7 billion to build his wall, he’s gone and asked for $8.6 billion for a barricade on the U.S.-Mexico border. (The art of the deal, folks!)

Here’s just some of what’s outlined in Trump’s proposal:

A 31 percent reduction in spending at the Environmental Protection Agency. Slashing the agency’s budget keeps his promises on the campaign trail to cut back on enforcement actions that hurt the bottom line of the fossil fuel industry.
The Department of Energy would see an 11 percent decrease from current funding, to $31.7 billion. That smaller budget would mean cuts to the DOE’s well-known innovation arm, the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, which is instrumental in developing world-class energy technology needed to help curb climate change.
The Interior Department — now under the helm of newly-minted director (and oil lobbyist) David Bernhardt — would see a 14 percent cut, to $12.5 billion.
A repeal of the tax credit for electric vehicles
Selling off the Washington Aqueduct, which provides water to the metro D.C. area.
Privatizing federally owned transmission lines

On the plus side, lawmakers have declined to enact most of Trump’s previous funding requests. Now that Democrats are in the majority in the House, it’s even more likely this budget is going nowhere.

“This budget is the Republican approach to governing in a nutshell: Cut taxes for the super-rich and then, when it’s time to fund national priorities, lecture us about tightening our belts,” said Rep. Raúl Grijalva, a Democrat from Arizona, in a statement. “If you think environment conservation is an unaffordable luxury, you’ll love this plan. This isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on, it’s dead on arrival in Congress, and printing it was a waste of time.”

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Trump’s ‘Budget for a better America’ means worse climate change

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The Department of Interior is a hostile place to work if you’re Native American.

On Monday, EPA chief Scott Pruitt announced that he’s trashing federal standards that aim to bring the average vehicle to 55 miles per gallon by 2025.

Pruitt also said he may tear up a decades-old waiver that allows California to set its own pollution and gas-mileage standards above the federal government’s. Because so many car buyers live in California, most automakers comply with the state’s higher standard.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra is ready to fight back. “The Trump Administration’s assault on clean car standards risks our ability to protect our children’s health, tackle climate change, and save hardworking Americans money,” he said in a statement. “We’re ready to file suit if needed to protect these critical standards and to fight the Administration’s war on our environment. California didn’t become the sixth-largest economy in the world by spectating.”

Pruitt said that the standards were unrealistic, and that it didn’t make sense for California to set the default rules: “Cooperative federalism doesn’t mean that one state can dictate standards for the rest of the country,” he said in an EPA statement.

While the statement says that the California waiver is being “reexamined,” it sounds like Pruitt may have already made up his mind.

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The Department of Interior is a hostile place to work if you’re Native American.

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There’s a lot of confusion at the Department of the Interior, and it’s not just about doors.

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There’s a lot of confusion at the Department of the Interior, and it’s not just about doors.

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Most members of the National Park Service Advisory Board got so frustrated they quit.

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Most members of the National Park Service Advisory Board got so frustrated they quit.

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Hey — everyone can get into national parks for free on Monday.

Here’s the idea: Build underwater barriers in front of the glaciers most vulnerable to collapse, keeping warm ocean water from sloshing in to melt them.

Princeton glaciology postdoc Michael Wolovick presented this concept at the American Geophysical Union conference in December, as the Atlantic reports.

The Antarctic glaciers Wolovick studies are subject to disastrous feedback loops: The more they melt, the more they are exposed to melt-inducing seawater. Recent studies have suggested these massive stores of ice could collapse much faster than previously thought, potentially raising sea levels by 5 to 15 feet by the end of the century (that’s seriously bad news for coastal cities).

Wolovick has been researching the feasibility of slowing that collapse with ‘sills’ constructed out of sand and rock along the fronts of these vulnerable glaciers. Unlike a seawall, they would be entirely underwater, but would keep warm ocean water from reaching a glacier’s vulnerable base.

That could stall glacial retreat dramatically, and maybe even reverse it. In Wolovick’s virtual experiments, even the least successful version of the sills slowed a glacier’s collapse by 400 or 500 years.

It’s all still a huge if, Wolovick admits, that requires more research. But if it works, it could buy some crucial time against sea-level rise.

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Hey — everyone can get into national parks for free on Monday.

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Here are some of the best public comments on Trump’s national monument executive order.

In an April 26 directive, President Trump called for a review of 27 national monuments created after 1996, claiming there should be more public input on monument designations.

Public lands experts suggested the order was a ploy to open new turf for energy exploration. They said monuments receive plenty of public comment, both from specialists and average Joes.

The experts appear to be right.

Ahead of a June 10 deadline for the Interior Department’s review of Utah’s Bears Ears — among the newest national monuments, and a particularly contentious one — the department received a flood of nearly 150,000 opinions. The great majority implore the administration to leave Bears Ears and the other monuments be.

Poring over 150,000 missives is a definite tl;dr situation — so we pulled some highlights.

“This monument holds immense meaning for the indigenous peoples in the area and to destroy it would continue the erasure of indigenous beliefs and further the genocide of indigenous cultures,” wrote one commenter.

“The air that I breathed in was so much different from the air that I breathed in when I used to live in Korea,” wrote one respondent reminiscing about a trip to Bears Ears. “The visit reminded why our family had immigrated from Korea in first place [sic].”

But it wasn’t all adulations for our “national treasures.”

One comment labeled the designation of Bears Ears an “unjust and unfair federal land grab” — a sentiment echoed by the oil and gas industry. “Undo everything Obama did !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” read another.

The following commenter’s use of caps lock was not at all unique among the responses: “THESE LANDS ARE REAL AND PROVIDE AN REAL CHANCE TO EXPERIENCE SPIRITUAL CONNECTION AND PHYSICAL WONDER. WITHOUT THESE PLACES WE’LL ALL TRAPPED IN OUR IDEOLOGIES AND LIFE BECOMES HELL.”

“Must we destroy everything?” asked one person, while another chided Trump and Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to “show some respect for your goddamn country you monkeys.”

And one sly commenter sought to end the discussion on monuments before it began, appealing to Zinke’s unwavering adulation for a former president: “Teddy Roosevelt had the right idea!”

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Here are some of the best public comments on Trump’s national monument executive order.

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Why surfers care about plastics in the ocean (explained in a single photo)

This photo sums it up. Rise above plastics. Originally posted here:  Why surfers care about plastics in the ocean (explained in a single photo) ; ;Related ArticlesCalifornia nears a tipping point with single-use plasticsOutside the bubbleSan Francisco phases out single-use plastic water bottles on municipal property ;

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Why surfers care about plastics in the ocean (explained in a single photo)

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Video: Fly Along With NASA’s Cloud Hunters

Climb aboard NASA’s biggest flying laboratory to discover the climate change secrets of clouds. One of the biggest question marks hanging over climate studies right now is about the role of clouds and the aerosols, or tiny airborne particles, that shape them. The problem is clouds move fast, making them hard to model, and depending on their concentration at different altitudes, clouds can cool or heat the planet. Scientists agree that before they can build the best models to predict climate change, they first have to understand clouds. This summer, NASA has been working to crack this problem, at 30,000 feet, aboard a custom-equipped flying laboratory. Climate Desk was invited onboard for an eight-hour mission to suck the secrets out of clouds. Continue reading here –  Video: Fly Along With NASA’s Cloud Hunters ; ;Related ArticlesCan Drastic New Anti-Pollution Rules Help Clean Up Beijing’s Air?US Department of Interior Criticises State Over Keystone XL Impact ReportIs Climate Change Pushing Pests into Northern Farms? ;

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Video: Fly Along With NASA’s Cloud Hunters

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Liking isn’t helping

This article: Liking isn’t helping Related Articles No beach access for you Increasing our connection with those supporters who enable our mission the most What will we do when waters rise?

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Liking isn’t helping

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