Climate Change Threatens N.E. Coastal Birds

Rising sea levels brought on by climate change are threatening some of New England's signature coastal birds, according to a new study.

Climate Change Threatens N.E. Coastal Birds

Federal Law about Fracking: Loopholes & Exemptions

Oil and gas drilling generally, and fracking in particular, are provided with numerous loopholes and exemptions from federal law.  Those for six laws are outlined.

Federal Law about Fracking: Loopholes & Exemptions

European Capacity to Grow Food Is Plateauing, Scientist Warns

"Scarcity is now the problem. We have real constraints in water, soil erosion and yields all coming on top of climate change. It is a convergence that we have never faced before."

European Capacity to Grow Food Is Plateauing, Scientist Warns

Saturday, July 13, 2013

Solar PV to Hit Grid Parity, $134 Billion Annual Revenue by 2020

Global solar photovoltaic (PV) markets will finally begin to stabilize in 2013, according to Navigant Research’s Solar PV Market Forecasts, and will reach grid parity by 2020 as demand reorients toward both developing countries and maturing markets.

Market activity is expected to mainly shift from Europe toward Asia and the United States, even though it recently passed 10GW installed solar. Additional opportunity also exists in developing economies like Chile, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia, and if Navigant’s forecasts hold true worldwide revenue from solar PV installations will pass $134 billion by 2020.

Solar PV to Hit Grid Parity, $134 Billion Annual Revenue by 2020

New Report Tracks Decades of Climate Change

A new report from the World Meteorological Organization tries to contextualize the headlines of recent years by taking the long view – considering all those heat waves, droughts and storms not as single events, but across decades.

New Report Tracks Decades of Climate Change

Is Thorium a Magic Bullet for Our Energy Problems?

As the search for cheap, safe and non-carbon emitting sources of energy continues, a band of scientists say the answer may be nuclear reactors fueled by thorium. What if there was a nuclear reactor that was meltdown safe, generated power inexpensively, created no weapons-grade byproducts, and burnt up existing stockpiled nuclear waste?


Is Thorium a Magic Bullet for Our Energy Problems?

Saturday, July 06, 2013

Coal’s Slipping Grip: New England Leads the Way

Many aging New England coal plants, which emit large quantities of soot and mercury as well as planet-warming greenhouse gases, have retired in the past decade or converted to natural gas. Of the six still connected to the region's electric grid, two are in the process of closing.

Coal’s Slipping Grip: New England Leads the Way

Contaminated Water, Land Damage, and Earthquakes: The Legacy of Waste Injection Wells

Early scientific analysis predicted that the risks associated with hazardous waste injection wells would be negligible. Unfortunately, experience has indicated that disposing of hazardous waste deep underground has been linked to  water contamination, destroyed ecosystems, toxic leaks and  earthquakes.

Now we are learning that there is a difference between scientific analysis and scientific evidence.

In a recent extensive report by ProPublica, John Apps, leading geoscientist, who advises the Department of Energy for Lawrence Berkeley National Labs, said that the science used to go forward with disposal wells was not sound.

Contaminated Water, Land Damage, and Earthquakes: The Legacy of Waste Injection Wells

Josh Fox’s “Gasland II” to Expose Power Politics of Fracking

Gasland Part II, scheduled to air on HBO on July 8, aims to expose the money and political power driving the rush to gas — although it does also feature pictures of a homeowner in Texas lighting his garden hose on fire.

“This isn’t just about fracking at all anymore. This is about our system of government, and this is about climate change,” Fox said in a telephone interview.

Josh Fox’s “Gasland II” to Expose Power Politics of Fracking

Climate Change Is Making Fires Like Arizona's the New Norm Across the Drought Stricken West

There's a dangerous but basic equation behind the killer Yarnell Hill, Arizona wildfire and other blazes raging across the West this summer: More heat, more drought, more fuel and more people in the way are adding up to increasingly ferocious fires.

Scientists say a hotter planet will only increase the risk.

Climate Change Is Making Fires Like Arizona's the New Norm Across the Drought Stricken West

How Will Europe Prepare for the Next Flood?

The widespread flooding of the past month in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and parts of Hungary and the Czech Republic has been some of the worst in history. The situation was so dire in some places, German local governments had to resort to extreme measures.

The climatic conditions that caused the recent flooding can be attributed to a low-pressure weather system that remained stuck north of the Alps for several days, resulting in an inordinately concentrated single torrential downpour. Stuck weather systems are responsible for other extreme weather conditions, such as the European heat wave of 2003. That event was caused by the inverse condition: a high-pressure area that remained stuck over most of Western Europe for several days.

Stuck weather systems, known as "blocking events," result when one of the jet streams -- air currents that whisk around the Earth's upper troposphere 4.3 to 12 miles up -- pinches off large air masses from the normal wind flow for an extended period of time. These pinches or kinks last for several days, sometimes for weeks, and cause weather patterns simply to stall, resulting in floods, heat waves, droughts and blizzards.

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center oceanographer Sirpa Häkkinen and her team analyzed atmospheric data from the 20th century and found that blocking events now occur about 30 percent more often than they did during most of the last millennium. Since the 1990s, the trend has been upward.

How Will Europe Prepare for the Next Flood?