Tag Archives: texas

The Koch brothers and their buddies are trying to kill a carbon-tax ballot initiative in Washington state.

by BillyGrimshaw8 Posted on November 7, 2016

Cushing, Oklahoma, was shaken on Sunday night by a 5.0 magnitude temblor. About 40 to 50 buildings were damaged, some substantially, according to the Associated Press, but no major injuries have been reported. The quake was felt as far away as Illinois, Iowa, and Texas.

Cushing — aka the “Pipeline Crossroads of the World” — is home to one of the largest oil storage terminals in the world. In 2012, President Obama visited Cushing to promote his support for the oil and gas industry.

But that same oil and gas industry has spurred a surge of earthquakes in Oklahoma, which are triggered when drillers inject wastewater underground. In 2005, prior to the state’s current oil and gas boom, there was only one earthquake of magnitude 3.0 or higher in Oklahoma. In 2015, there were more than 900.

Just in the last week, there have been about two dozen quakes in the state. Luckily, no damage has been reported to the Cushing oil terminal. But how long will that luck last?

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The Koch brothers and their buddies are trying to kill a carbon-tax ballot initiative in Washington state.

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For every ton of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere, we lose 32 square feet of Arctic sea ice.

by RicardoCorbould Posted on November 3, 2016

This is according to a new study in Science. That’s a sizable slab: Rose and Jack could have floated on a ’burg that big with room to spare (and Titanic would still end with a frozen hunk!).

If you live in the U.S., you are accountable for about 17 tons of CO2 a year. That’s roughly 1.4 tons a month, or one and a half Rose-and-Jack rafts every 30 days. Multiply that by 300 million people in the States, plus Europe, plus Australia, plus … you get the picture. In the last 30 years, we’ve lost enough ice to cover Texas twice over.

Thirty-two square feet per ton is a scary, but useful, statistic. It nails a number to our individual actions, the consequences of which might otherwise seem abstract, says Dirk Notz of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg, Germany.

For example, Notz offers, a round trip flight from New York to London knocks out 32 square feet of summer sea ice “for every single seat” — something to factor in when you’re calculating the price of a ticket home.

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For every ton of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere, we lose 32 square feet of Arctic sea ice.

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Liberals No Longer Allowed to Nominate Supreme Court Justices

by JuliannPRY Posted on November 1, 2016

Mother Jones

The latest hotness on the right is to promise not just to hold up Senate hearings on Merrick Garland until we get a new president, but to hold up all hearings for all Supreme Court nominees forever if Hillary Clinton wins:

That prospect — which could impact every aspect of American life including climate regulations, abortion and gun rights — was first raised by Senator John McCain of Arizona, then Ted Cruz of Texas and now Richard Burr of North Carolina, who CNN reported Monday talked up the idea at a private event over the weekend.

“If Hillary Clinton becomes president, I am going to do everything I can do to make sure four years from now, we still got an opening on the Supreme Court,” Burr, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told a group of Republican volunteers, according to CNN.

Marco Rubio, taking his usual craven approach to political landmines, says it would be wrong to blockade everyone, but it would be OK to blockade anyone who’s not a conservative:

“If it’s someone good who understands that their job is to apply the constitution, according to its original intent, then that will be a welcome surprise,” he said. “But barring whether it’s Republican or a Democrat, if they appoint someone who I believe doesn’t meet that standard I’ll oppose that nominee.”

Ross Douthat explains the principled thinking behind this strategy:

There you have it. Liberal views of the law are inherently illegitimate, so Democrats don’t get to pick any more Supreme Court justices. There’s a name for this kind of republic. Starts with a B. Not quite coming to me, though.

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Liberals No Longer Allowed to Nominate Supreme Court Justices

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The most accurate picture of the Dakota Access showdown is on social media.

by CarolineD27 Posted on October 28, 2016

The Ross Sea marine reserve, which covers 600,000 square miles of the Southern Ocean off coast of the Antarctic, will be protected from commercial fishing for the next 35 years. Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, an international consortium of governments, approved it unanimously on Thursday.

At nearly twice the size of Texas, the area is home to over 10,000 species of flora and fauna, including penguins, seals, whales, seabirds, and fish.

But Ross Sea is also important for the valuable role it plays in research on the impact of climate change on marine ecosystems.

Secretary of State John Kerry celebrated the park as “one of the last unspoiled ocean wilderness areas on the planet,” and a sign of “further proof that the world is finally beginning to understand the urgency of the threats facing our planet.”

There are some environmentalists who say the designation doesn’t go far enough. World Wildlife Foundation’s Chris Johnson noted that the agreement must be made permanent.

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The most accurate picture of the Dakota Access showdown is on social media.

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ExxonMobil just got some bad news.

by JadaMcBride3335 Posted on October 27, 2016

The New York State Supreme Court is requiring the oil giant and its accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers to turn over documents subpoenaed by state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. He’s conducting a fraud investigation into the company, spurred by a report from InsideClimate News last year that revealed Exxon knew fossil fuel burning was heating up the atmosphere back in the 1970s and deliberately misled the public about it.

Earlier this month, Exxon attempted to halt the investigation by suing Schneiderman, as well as Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey, and arguing that their investigations are politically motivated.

Exxon has also been arguing, under a Texas statute, that documents held by PricewaterhouseCoopers are privileged. But yesterday, the New York court ruled against the company on that point. The court, as the Washington Post reports, determined that New York law, not Texas law, governs the dispute, and ordered the company to comply with Schneiderman’s subpoena.

Schneiderman was pleased with the ruling, of course. He said he looks forward to “moving full-steam ahead with our fraud investigation” and called on Exxon to “cooperate with, rather than resist,” the probe.

ExxonMobil has no such intention. The company said it will appeal the ruling.

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ExxonMobil just got some bad news.

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Obama Fights Back in the Battle Over Where Transgender Kids Pee

by EdwardoIks Posted on October 21, 2016

Mother Jones

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The Obama administration is pushing back against a ruling by a Texas judge that dealt a serious blow to its fight for transgender rights.

On Thursday, the Department of Education announced that it would appeal an August decision by US District Judge Reed O’Connor. O’Connor’s decision temporarily allowed schools across the country to block trans students from the bathroom of their choice until the courts decide whether doing so violates federal civil rights law.

The judge’s decision came in response to a lawsuit filed by Texas and 12 other states against the Department of Education, after the department threatened to pull federal funding from schools that did not allow trans kids to use bathrooms matching their gender identity, rather than the sex listed on their birth certificate. With its appeal, the Obama administration will take the case to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, one of the country’s most conservative appellate courts.

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Obama Fights Back in the Battle Over Where Transgender Kids Pee

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Fossil fuel favorite Lamar Smith just lost a big ol’ endorsement.

by Nathanmlm Posted on October 19, 2016

The San Antonio Express-News, the fourth-largest daily newspaper in Texas, has refused to repeat its prior endorsement of Rep. Smith, who has represented Texas’ 21st congressional district since 1987.

Smith is chair of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee — and a climate change denier. The paper’s editorial board accuses him of “abuse” of that position and “bullying on the issue of climate change”:

[L]ast year Smith threatened the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Kathryn Sullivan, with criminal charges if she didn’t release emails from scientists about a certain climate change study. That study refuted gospel by deniers that global warming slowed between 1998 and 2012.

Smith said he was shielding scientific inquiry. But the real effect would be to chill such efforts. And in 2015, Smith sought to cut NASA funding for earth science — a science that includes climate science research. He said the agency should focus on space exploration. Both are necessary.

The non-endorsement ends with an acknowledgment that Smith will probably win in his largely conservative district anyway.

Luckily for Smith, he has other friends in high places: namely, the fossil fuel industry, which has donated more than $92,000 to his campaign this season.

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Fossil fuel favorite Lamar Smith just lost a big ol’ endorsement.

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Elon Musk has a big idea to save civilization: Move it to Mars.

by DamionBenefield Posted on September 28, 2016

Myron Ebell, a director at the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute, would head Trump’s EPA transition team, E&E Daily reports. Ebell also chairs the Cooler Heads Coalition, a pro-business group focused on pushing climate denial.

While Ebell generally maintains that climate change is a hoax, he’s also argued that if it does exist, it’s actually a good thing. “Life in many places would become more pleasant,” he wrote in 2006. “Instead of 20 below zero in January in Saskatoon, it might be only 10 below. And I don’t think too many people would complain if winters in Minneapolis became more like winters in Kansas City.” He has less to say about the summers in Minneapolis, which, if current emissions trends continue, will feel like summers in Mesquite, Texas, by 2100.

Ebell’s waffling is in-line with the candidate’s, who seems to have spontaneously changed his mind about climate change during the first presidential debate. When accused by Hillary Clinton of calling climate change a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese, Trump flat-out denied it, despite a notorious tweet saying just that.

Ebell joins energy lobbyist Mike McKenna, George W. Bush’s former Interior Department solicitor David Bernhardt, and oil tycoon Harold Hamm on Trump’s team.

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Elon Musk has a big idea to save civilization: Move it to Mars.

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India will jump on the bandwagon for global climate action.

by NellCarrillo Posted on September 26, 2016

Myron Ebell, a director at the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute, would head Trump’s EPA transition team, E&E Daily reports. Ebell also chairs the Cooler Heads Coalition, a pro-business group focused on pushing climate denial.

While Ebell generally maintains that climate change is a hoax, he’s also argued that if it does exist, it’s actually a good thing. “Life in many places would become more pleasant,” he wrote in 2006. “Instead of 20 below zero in January in Saskatoon, it might be only 10 below. And I don’t think too many people would complain if winters in Minneapolis became more like winters in Kansas City.” He has less to say about the summers in Minneapolis, which, if current emissions trends continue, will feel like summers in Mesquite, Texas, by 2100.

Ebell’s waffling is in-line with the candidate’s, who seems to have spontaneously changed his mind about climate change during the first presidential debate. When accused by Hillary Clinton of calling climate change a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese, Trump flat-out denied it, despite a notorious tweet saying just that.

Ebell joins energy lobbyist Mike McKenna, George W. Bush’s former Interior Department solicitor David Bernhardt, and oil tycoon Harold Hamm on Trump’s team.

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India will jump on the bandwagon for global climate action.

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Gas shortages hit the Southeast after a major pipeline leak in Alabama.

by ramonfitzsimmons Posted on September 20, 2016

Despite the political and market forces arrayed against it, the coal industry is still clinging to life, pushing forward massive new mines, export terminals, railway lines, and power plants.

In a special report this week, Grist examines the struggling industry’s long game, including one company’s efforts to build a $700 million project on the Chuitna River in south-central Alaska. Here are seven other places where the American coal industry is trying to resuscitate itself at the expense of, well, the rest of us:

  1. Millennium Bulk Coal Terminal Longview, Washington

Even after major backer Arch Coal declared bankruptcy and dropped its stake in 2016, the $640 million export terminal won’t die.

  1. Oakland Bulk and Oversized Terminal Oakland, California

The city council and Gov. Jerry Brown oppose the $1.2 billion proposal, but developers are threatening legal action.

  1. Wishbone Hill Coal Mine Matanuska-Susitna Borough, Alaska

The project had cleared most of its regulatory hurdles when members of the the nearby Chickaloon tribe filed a lawsuit.

  1. Coal Hollow Mine Kane County, Utah

A company with a history of cleanup violations wants an expansion that would double the mine’s annual output.

  1. Kayenta Mine Navajo County, Arizona

Located on reservation lands on Arizona’s Black Mesa, the Peabody-owned mine opened in 1973 but faces new opposition.

  1. Dos Republicas Mine Eagle Pass, Texas

Opened for business in November 2015, the mine on the U.S.-Mexico border threatens archaeological sites and burial grounds.

  1. Kemper County Energy Facility Kemper County, Mississippi

Mississippi’s $6.7 billion “clean coal” plant has been criticized as excessively expensive and too carbon-heavy, but officials say it could be operational by October.

Read our special report: Coal’s Last Gamble.

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Gas shortages hit the Southeast after a major pipeline leak in Alabama.

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