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This is how much the fossil fuel industry spends to avoid climate regs

This is how much the fossil fuel industry spends to avoid climate regs

By on 7 Apr 2016commentsShare

ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell, along with three oil industry trade groups, spend close to an estimated $115 million annually to obstruct policies that would address climate change around the world, according to a report released by Influence Map, a British nonprofit that conducts research on how corporations influence political inaction.

The report shows the American Petroleum Institute as the clear heavyweight spender, followed by ExxonMobil, Shell, the Western States Petroleum Association, and the Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association.

Influence Map

But the $27 million Exxon spent, for example, was just a drop in the bucket compared to the company’s annual earnings of $16 billion last year (which technically was a bad year; Exxon earned double that in 2014).

Using guidelines set out by the United Nations on climate lobbying practices, Influence Map combed through lobbying registers, Internal Revenue Service documents, and annual financial reports to find how much these groups devoted to opposing climate policy. The report, which is not peer reviewed, counts spending on lobbying, political contributions, and advocacy in its overall number, but it’s probably an underestimation: It does not include dark money spent on outside organizations.

Still, $115 million is already a lot more than what the other side is spending to push through pro-climate reform. The researchers estimate that climate-advocacy investor groups have spent less than $5 million. But their pro-climate campaign to reform fossil fuel companies from within has picked up momentum all the same. In 2016 alone, oil and gas shareholders have filed 45 resolutions related to climate change, many of them demanding that major energy companies disclose how it will impact their business.

Despite the momentum, the report observes the pro-climate side will need a “significant ramp up in investment and activity” to match Big Oil’s war chest.

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This is how much the fossil fuel industry spends to avoid climate regs

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More than 100 years of car evolution could reveal where the industry is going next

More than 100 years of car evolution could reveal where the industry is going next

By on 6 Apr 2016 6:05 pmcommentsShare

Unless you’re a couple of crusty old white guys, the future of cars is looking pretty bright. Affordable electric cars are about to hit the market, self-driving cars are practicing their not-hitting-people skills, sleek 3D-printed cars are becoming a thing. And in a world that desperately needs to be more efficient and rely less on fossil fuels, this is all promising news.

But predicting the future of technology is always hard and often leads to egg-covered faces and tarnished reputations. The former chair of IBM, for example, once famously said that “there is a world market for maybe five computers.” And boy does that guy have about a billion eggs on his face right now.

Fortunately, a new (yet to be peer-reviewed) study on arXiv.org offers a way to predict where our technologies are going by first looking at where they’ve been. The study, led by researchers at UCLA, presents an evolutionary model for technology, and with the automobile as a case study, suggests that “electric and hybrid cars may be experiencing the early stages of a radiation event, with dramatic diversification expected in the next three to four decades.”

The model includes data on 3,575 cars made by 172 manufacturers between 1896 and 2014. It considers each car model a distinct species whose first and last years of production mark its origin and extinction, respectively. It thus offers a rate of “species” origination and extinction over time, allowing the researchers to analyze the effects of outside factors like GDP, oil prices, and market competition on the size and diversity of species types.

Not surprisingly, they found declines in origination in 1933, during the Great Depression. They also found declining extinction rates in 1935, again corresponding to the Great Depression, and in 1960, when the “Big Three” automakers (General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler) hit their peak.

More surprising was that the model showed that the rate of new species hitting the market had decreased fourfold between 1980 and 2014 and that extinction rates slightly outpaced origination rates during that time, meaning the market has gotten less diverse. At the same time, the average lifespan of models increased.

This happened, the researchers speculate, because certain designs began to dominate, and experimenting with new ones became too costly. The resulting market consolidation increased brand loyalty, stabilized cost of production, and made for safe investing. And it showed that market competition is more strongly correlated with species diversity than other factors like GDP or the price of oil.

Which brings us back to today. Electric vehicles haven’t gone through the decades of evolution that gas-powered cars have, which is perhaps why a relatively new brand like Tesla can come in with its shaky production schedules and unsteady financial standing and shake up the market. And in the coming decades, according to this research, we can expect more competitors to join Tesla’s Model 3 and GM’s Chevy Bolt before the market ultimately settles on dependable models and creativity in the industry declines once again.

By that point, though, we’ll surely be in the midst of a flying car diversity boom. That’s one tech prediction that will never die, no matter how many times it’s blown up in people’s faces.

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Republicans Decide to Boycott the Supreme Court Vacancy. Does This Remind You of Anyone?

Mother Jones

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The Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee have officially announced that they aren’t willing to even hold hearings for President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee—no matter who it is.1 There’s all the usual argle bargle about needing to “protect the will of the American people” blah blah blah, but none of that matters. They’re doing this because they want to do it and they have the power to do it. I doubt that Democrats would act much differently under similar circumstances.

That said, you can add me to the huge crowd of observers who are puzzled by the political tactics here. The obvious question is: Why refuse to even hold hearings? That just makes Republicans look sullen and obstructionist. Why not hold hearings normally, drag them out a little bit, and then vote down whoever Obama nominates? The result is the same, but Republicans look more like senators and less like small children throwing a temper tantrum.

I suppose the answer is that this is a good way of firing up their base, and they think that’s more important than appealing to the center. Fair enough. But that raises another question: What’s the best way to fire up the Republican base? I’m not trying to troll anyone here, but it seems like the answer is to hold hearings. That would keep the whole Supreme Court issue front and center for months on end. The base would be faced almost daily with the prospect of what a liberal justice would do; talk radio would go nuts; and there would be endless chances to find specific problems with the nominee—many of which would coincidentally require the production of reams of files and records to trawl through.

Democrats, conversely, would have less to get fired up about. Sure, they’d be unhappy, but they wouldn’t be able to carp endlessly about Republican obstruction. Their guy is getting a hearing, after all.

So it seems like holding hearings normally would be a better way to fire up the GOP base and a better way to keep the Democratic base a little quieter. It probably wouldn’t make a huge difference either way, but it’s still a win-win. What am I missing here?

1After which they undoubtedly went out for a beer and shared their bewilderment about the fact that so many Republicans have been trained to vote for a guy like Donald Trump. What could possibly have driven them in such a direction?

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Republicans Decide to Boycott the Supreme Court Vacancy. Does This Remind You of Anyone?

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5 Healthy, Green Home Hacks

If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleepingwith a mosquito. ~Dalai Lama XIV

No. Really.

A lot of people ask me if one small change in their daily habit is really going to make a difference and to that I reply, of course!

Lets face itit can be overwhelming trying to change all of your (bad) habits at once, but my motto is to take baby steps. Its more fun. Its more do-able. And, youre more likely to stick with your new habit over the long run.

To get started, here are a few reuse home hacks that will not only help heal our beautiful planet, but will pad your wallet with some generous savings.

But first, listen to myGreen Divas at Home radio show segment. Then read on for more!

Now do I have your attention?

1. Clean with Microfiber Towels vs. Paper Towels

Paper towelsmay be the default for tackling household cleaning tasks, but absorbent microfiber towels can do anything paper towels or wipes can do, and microfiber usually does a better job of whisking up dirt and grease. They wont scratch surfaces, leave no lint behind, and can be washed about fifty times. Buy several so you can throw them in the wash and grab another as you clean.

Reducing yourpaper towel usewill help conserve trees and cut down on the pollution produced in the bleaching process. Using one roll of paper towels per week, at $1.25 per roll, will cost you $70 per year. A stack of reusable microfiber towels is about $19.99. Thats an annual savings of around $50.00!

2. Reuse Plastic Snack Bags

Do your part to reduce the over 20 million disposable snack bags that end up in landfills each year. Most families spend $85 a year on disposable plastic baggies according to the Sierra Club. Plastic disposable Ziploc bags make convenient food storage and freezer bags, but discarding them is a waste of money and resources.

The Blue Avocado (re)zipSeal Reusable Snack and Sandwich Bags can easily extend their life tenfold. PVC-, lead- and BPA-free, each (re)zip features a unique double-lock closure that keeps liquids and food fresh inside. Using just onere(zip) at least twice a week can eliminate over 100 disposable plastic baggies per year. With a one time investment of $5.95-9.95 vs. repeatedly purchasing new resealable bags equals long-term saving of hundreds of dollars.

Or, try Baggie Wash; the first-of-its-kind dishwasher accessory that allows you to easily clean and reuse your zipper-style food storage bags 50 times.Bag-E-Wash fits any make/model dishwasher and adjusts to fit any Ziploc style reusable bag from sandwich size up to gallon size bags.Just one box (30) of gallon size bags washed and dried with Bag-E-Wash and reused 50 times each keeps 1,500 bags out of our landfills & oceans. This equals asavings to you of $150.One time investment of $5.95-9.95 vs. repeatedly purchasing new resealable bags = long-term saving of hundreds of dollars.

3. Recharge Your Power

Did you know Americans purchase nearly three billion dry-cell batteries every year? Many of these contain toxic heavy metals like cadmium, mercury, andlead. Cadmium can cause damage to thekidneys, birth defects, andcancer. Mercury and lead are very potent neurotoxins. Whenbatteries end up in the landfill, these toxins can contaminate water supplies.

Newer pre-charged and ultra-low self-charge batteries are even more efficient and cost effective than their rechargeable predecessors. For example,some brandscan be used right out of the package and recharged up to 2,100 times. At around $21 for a four pack of AA batteries and charger, youre looking at less than half a cent per battery; a long-term savings of roughly $983.50 over each batterys lifetime.

4. BYOB

An estimated 500 billion to one trillion plastic bags are used annually worldwide. More than 14 million trees were chopped down to manufacture the 10 billion paper grocery bags used in the U.S. in 1999. Thats more than one million per minute!

Less than five percent of shoppers in America are using canvas, cotton, or mesh bags. Take a reusable cloth bag to the store. If not for you, do it for sea life. Of all known species of sea turtles, 86 percent have had problems of entanglement or ingestion of marine debris thousand years to decompose. Does this mean paper bags are more environmentally friendly than plastic? Although recycled more often, the production of paper sacks produce seventy percent more air pollutants and take up more space in the landfill than plastic bags.

5. Use Reusable Cutlery vs. Disposable

To reduce environmental impact, tryPreservespurposeful plastic products which utilize recycled plastics from yogurt cups into toothbrushes, storage containers and cutlery consisting of #5 polypropylene plastic (safe food grade material) thatsBPA-freeand dishwasher safe.

Another smart choice for plates and cutlery is bamboo. It is a fast growing, abundant, woody, perennial, evergreen plant that can grow three to four feet in one day! It can even be used for construction of houses, bridges, fences and furniture due to the durability of its short fibers.

Bonus:

Listen to the latest full episode of theGreen Divas Radio Show! It’spacked with fun and useful information from a lively conversation with Mariel Hemingway and Bobby Williams about creating mindful and sustainable relationships to eating sustainably with Dr. Karen Lee and one of our fav green dudes Rob Greenfield talks about living a zero waste life.

Catchthe latestGreen Divas Radio Showand other green, healthy and free radio showsdaily onGDGDRadio.com(or get theGDGD Radio app)!

Written by Green Diva Lisa Beres | Main image viaShutterStock

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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5 Healthy, Green Home Hacks

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While OPEC Meets, Oil Prices Continue to Plummet

Mother Jones

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With oil prices plummeting below $40 per barrel, OPEC is meeting to decide what to do. The answer is…. probably nothing:

Oil prices dropped Friday as traders braced for official word out of a highly anticipated meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Prices slid following conflicting media reports that OPEC had either kept its oil-output target unchanged or increased it. There was also confusion as to whether production in Indonesia, which just rejoined the group, will be included in the target.

….An internal OPEC document reviewed by The Wall Street Journal showed that, if current production remains unchanged, markets will still be oversupplied by 700,000 barrels a day in 2016….The key issue for OPEC is Iran, which is expected to return to the global oil market after the lifting of the international sanctions early next year. Analysts say the country could quickly ramp up production by around 500,000 barrels, adding to the oversupply of crude.

Between fracking, Iran, and slow demand growth thanks to the sluggish global economy, oil prices just aren’t likely to increase in the near future. This is:

Good news for consumers, who get cheaper gasoline.
Probably bad news for global warming, since it makes cleaner fuel sources uncompetitive with oil.
Bad news for OPEC members, which might be bad news for the rest of us. Low prices probably mean cutbacks in government services, which in turn could lead to more widespread unrest. Needless to say, this is not something the Middle East needs right now.
Good news for Hillary Clinton, since the fortunes of the incumbent party have historically been better when gas prices are lower.

Oh: and bad news for us peak oil folks. I don’t have any worries that we’ll hit peak oil eventually, but the Great Recession sure put off the date. I had long figured that 2015 was going to be the peak date, but it now looks like it will probably be 2020 at the earliest, and maybe more like 2025 or so.

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While OPEC Meets, Oil Prices Continue to Plummet

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Hackers are messing with the oil and gas industry

Hackers are messing with the oil and gas industry

By on 18 Nov 2015commentsShare

The best part about an oil and gas addiction — besides all the pollution, environmental degradation, and crippling income inequality, of course — is how pathetically vulnerable it makes us to cyber attacks.

Say you’re a hacker. Pick a cool name — something like Krazy Keys or The Epidemic. Now, say you want to really fuck with the U.S. economy (you’re still reeling over those damn Starbucks cups). What better way to take down Uncle Sam than to target the slick, gooey oil that is his life blood? Fortunately for you, Cyber Satan, a growing number of oil and gas companies are making that pretty easy to do.

By connecting their infrastructure to the ever-expanding network of internet-enabled devices known as of the Internet of Things (check out our explainer video here), these companies are automating their operations and thus improving efficiency, but they’re also opening themselves up to cyber attacks. Here’s more from Motherboard:

The industry has a lot of different moving parts and processes, including pump control, blow-out prevention, and managing gas storage. Unexpected changes to these processes or the operations technology systems that run them can have a major impact like production stoppages or even damage to the infrastructure.

“Maybe the hackers’ intentions may not be to destroy something, but by not understanding the full picture of the system or what component of it they are messing with, they can have a real catastrophic effect,” said (cyber security expert Jasper Graham). This could be anything from bringing productivity to a standstill to disabling alarm systems or communications between workers on the field, which could put their safety at risk.

Already, there have been a number of attacks on oil companies around the world. In 2012, a group called The Cutting Sword of Justice (real name) attacked Saudi Aramco, partially or fully wiping files on 35,000 computers, Motherboard reports. The hackers didn’t manage to tamper with any pumping or drilling operations, but the company did have to temporarily shut down all of its computers. And last year, dozens of oil companies in Norway fell prey to unidentified internet marauders. Even Anonymous is getting in on the action, according to Motherboard. The notorious hacking group targeted gas stations earlier this year.

Unfortunately, oil and gas companies aren’t the only ones failing to protect themselves against cybersecurity threats. The Internet of Things is taking over a lot of our infrastructure, and most of that infrastructure isn’t ready to take on hackers. On the plus side, the oil industry is pretty evil, so as long as Queen Crypto and The Wackadoodle aren’t hurting anyone or creating serious economic mayhem, more power to them. And besides, the environmental movement is always in desperate need of a little badassery. These Hackers might just do the trick:

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The Internet of Things Is Making Oil Production Vulnerable to Hacking

, Motherboard.

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American Farmers Need a Strong RFS

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American Farmers Need a Strong RFS

Posted 20 October 2015 in

National

Earlier this month, the National Farmers Union and the National Corn Growers Association released a white paper detailing the dramatic toll that uncertainty over the Renewable Fuel Standard has taken on rural economies. Projections for American farmers’ net cash income in 2015 show a 26 percent decrease from peak levels in 2013.

The RFS, which is the only federal law on the books combating climate change, has driven sustainable growth in renewable fuel for a decade. The renewable fuel industry sparked an economic revolution that raised farm incomes across sectors while creating jobs in rural communities. U.S. farmers increased their production by investing in better technology and sustainable acreage expansion.

But the EPA’s failure to release the rules for 2013, 2014, and 2015 has caused net farm income to likely fall more than 50 percent in only two years. When the farm community loses, the whole country loses.

By sidestepping its responsibilities on the RFS, the EPA is putting American jobs, investments, and innovations at risk.

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American Farmers Need a Strong RFS

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This “clean cow” feed could help cut emissions from livestock

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This “clean cow” feed could help cut emissions from livestock

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This Is Mike Huckabee’s Brain on Ethanol

Mother Jones

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Mike Huckabee said the right things at the Iowa Ag Summit in March. Charlie Neibergall/AP

On the campaign trail, GOP presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee has been a vocal supporter of the ethanol industry. The former Arkansas governor has repeatedly spoken out in defense of the Renewable Fuel Standard—the federal policy that requires energy companies to blend billions of gallons of biofuels into the nation’s gasoline and diesel supply. That makes political sense in Iowa, where corn is big business. Ethanol made from corn constitutes the vast majority of domestic biofuel consumption. And roughly 40 percent of corn grown in the United States is used to produce ethanol.

So it was a bit surprising when Huckabee used his latest book to take direct aim at biofuels such as ethanol. In the middle of a chapter questioning the science of climate change, he suggested that biofuels have been propped up by unscientific “environmentalist policies” that drive up food prices and make global warming worse. Here’s the relevant passage from God, Guns, Grits, and Gravy, which was published in January:

Climate change isn’t the only field in which the environmental movement has claimed to represent unassailable scientific truth, only to be brought up short by new data.

For years, we were told that biofuels were the future. Skeptics who questioned whether it took more energy to create a gallon of fuel from corn than was generated by burning it were dismissed. But as we devoted more and more of our food crops to energy production, we discovered yet again that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. (Science!) In this case, so-called environmentalist policies hurt the poor when the supply of corn and other grains fell, causing skyrocketing food prices and shortages that led to riots in undeveloped nations. At this writing, the European Union has just agreed to limit biofuels, for those reasons and also because they were found to make some engines run less efficiently, to cause more pollution than expected, and to harm the environment and contribute to global warming, due to the need for clear-cutting more farmland.

Huckabee’s professed skepticism about biofuels actually echoes the views shared by a number of conservative activists and environmentalists. But it diverges greatly from much of what he has said and written elsewhere. For example, here’s what Huckabee wrote in his 2007 book, From Hope to Higher Ground:

One energy source that makes perfect sense for America to aggressively explore and dramatically increase is the production and use of biofuels. The most common biofuels are ethanol and biodiesel, both of which have the potential of decreasing our dependence on oil, but could also have a dramatic and positive impact on America’s agricultural production. It could give our farmers the ability to feed and fuel us. While the cost of converting a biofuel source to usable fuel has been historically expensive and therefore not as attractive as gasoline, creating incentives with potential hefty financial rewards could be valuable in the production of ethanol and biodiesel. New technologies using forms of biomass are increasingly viable, and the production of these would be controlled within our own borders. An added advantage of biofuels is that unlike gasoline and conventional diesel, they contain oxygen, which allows petroleum products to burn more completely, reducing air pollution and cutting back on the buildup of greenhouse gases.

Huckabee reportedly backed the Renewable Fuel Standard during the 2008 campaign (although, in at least one debate, he appeared to reject the idea of biofuel mandates). At the time, his campaign website said that “we need more ethanol.”

This past March—less than two months after slamming biofuels in his book—Huckabee attended the Iowa Ag Summit in Des Moines, where spent 20 minutes answering questions posed by ethanol kingpin and GOP megadonor Bruce Rastetter. “You’ve been an unabashed supporter of the RFS,” Rastetter said.

“Yeah,” responded Huckabee, adding that the biofuel mandate was part of a “bigger picture of energy independence and energy security” that could help the United States “turn the tables” on Russia and Iran. He didn’t say anything about “skyrocketing food prices.” You can watch the exchange here:

Huckabee addressed the issue again at a May 7 campaign event in Sioux City, where he argued that ending government support for ethanol puts farmers and companies “out of business, and it destroys what is beginning to become a more reasonable, responsible, and economically viable industry.”

I asked Huckabee’s campaign how they reconcile the candidate’s campaign-trail biofuels boosterism with the sharp criticism leveled in his book. They didn’t respond.

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This Is Mike Huckabee’s Brain on Ethanol

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California’s Insane Nut Boom, In 3 Simple Charts

Mother Jones

California has entered the age of King Nut: The state produces more than 80 percent of the world’s almonds, and roughly 30 and 40 percent of the world’s pistachios and walnuts, respectively. Most of the production takes place in the Central Valley, a swath of farmland in California’s midsection.

A single almond requires a gallon of water to grow—bad news in the midst of California’s worst drought in half a millennium. But with ever-rising demand in a nut-crazed world, farmers continue to expand orchards, pumping water out of the ground to make up for the dried-up surface water. These charts tell the story:

By Lei Wang and Julia Lurie

As my colleague Tom Philpott recently reported, Since 2011, central California has lost “more water than all 38 million Californians use for domestic and municipal supplies annually—over half of which is due to groundwater pumping in the Central Valley.”

Groundwater is the stuff of centuries: rain percolating for ages through pores of soil and rock, coming to rest in aquifers. In wet seasons, water generally begins its slow trickle-down journey to replenish the aquifers (the small upward spikes in the third chart above). But as Jay Famiglietti, the NASA water scientist who gathered the groundwater data, has stated, “The downs are way bigger than the ups, which means that groundwater levels are on a one-way journey to the very bottom of the Central Valley.”

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California’s Insane Nut Boom, In 3 Simple Charts

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