Category Archives: environmental news

environmental news

Less ice, more water, more danger

I keep wondering when the climate-change deniers are going to get the message: Earth’s climate is changing and the consequences of that change are potentially catastrophic.

A new report suggests that the ice in Antarctica not only is melting, but its rate of melt is accelerating. When the ice melts, it creates lots and lots of water. What happens, then, to the coastal communities that sit next to our oceans?

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/12/03/global_warming_antarctica_is_losing_more_than_6_billion_tons_of_ice_annually.html

It’s science. It’s backed up with photographic evidence. It’s on the link attached to this blog post.

Yet some American politicians — egged on by extremists — keep suggesting that climate change is some kind of hoax. It’s a plot to “destroy the oil industry.” It’s a political gimmick.

Come on!

The debate shouldn’t be about whether Earth’s climate is changing. It should be about its cause.

I continue to believe that humankind has played a large role in the changing climate.

Those greenhouse gases do have an impact. The deforestation of much of the planet’s earth surface has an impact.

The effect of that activity can be seen through satellite pictures.

It’s science, man!

 

business news, environmental news, International news

Don't bet on OPEC

It’s gratifying to me to see the United States and Canada standing up to other oil-producing regions in the ongoing battle to control the price of fossil fuel.

According to an analysis on MSN.com, the North Americans are winning the fight.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/opec-is-wrong-to-think-it-can-outlast-us-on-oil-prices/ar-BBgej5T

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries recently declined the opportunity to reduce production. The non-action sent Brent crude to new low prices. According to MSN: “The Saudis appear to be spoiling for a fight, trying to find out exactly how cheap oil must be to force surging U.S. shale-oil production to seize up like an unlubricated engine.”

The gratification comes in the knowledge that North Americans finally seem to understand the need to conserve energy and to use alternative sources of energy. Yes, the production of shale oil in North Dakota and Montana also is helping boost oil supplies that have been outstripping demand; the result has been the plummeting prices we’ve seen across the country.

Shale oil is less expensive to produce than when it first came onto the oil-production scene, according to MSN.

Add the falling production costs of shale oil and the growing use of alternative sources — wind, sunlight and hydropower, to name just three — then OPEC’s influence on world oil price becomes diminished.

We’ve come a good distance from the days of the Arab Oil Embargo, correct?

 

environmental news, International news

Here come the 'snow trolls'

Yes, this story was inevitable, given the brutal cold snap that has smacked much of the country.

A leftish media watchdog group refers to them as “snow trolls,” the folks who think that since it’s cold outside that global warming/climate change is a liberal plot.

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/01/07/cold-winter-weather-bring-on-the-snow-trolls/197464

My answer always to those who think like that simply is this: Look at the big picture, the longer term.

Some noted publications have noted, for example, that the Texas Panhandle will be wetter and colder than normal this winter. I’ll cite the Farmer’s Almanac as one such source. Its accuracy is about as reliable as most weather forecasters, which likely isn’t very reliable.

But it got cold around here the past few days and in this part of the world, which is full of climate-change deniers, it provides plenty of grist for the so-called “snow trolls” to suggest the liberal plot conspiracy is at work regarding climate change.

Lake Erie is producing mountains of lake-effect snow in upstate New York. The Buffalo Bills are supposed to play host to a professional football game Sunday, but it looks dicey.

I know that the debate is ongoing. I also know that folks produce all kinds of scientific evidence that the planet is actually cooling off. There also is other evidence that suggests the opposite is happening. Year over year temperatures are increasing.

Those polar ice caps? They really are shrinking.

But as the comedian Stephen Colbert joked, the “snow trolls” sound like the guy who says “hunger is cured because I ate tonight.”

 

environmental news, International news, political news

Shocking! GOP opposes U.S.-China climate deal

Does it surprise anyone at all that congressional Republicans would be highly critical of a deal struck this week between the United States and China to cut carbon gases over the next couple of decades?

I didn’t think so.

U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, the incoming chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, wasted little time in calling the pact a “non-binding charade.”

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/223823-inhofe-us-china-climate-pact-a-non-binding-charade

And the deal is … ?

President Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao agreed the nations should cut carbon emissions by as much as 30 percent by 2030. Inhofe — one of the Senate’s premier climate change deniers — said China will continue to build coal-fired power plants and has “no known reserves” of natural gas on which to rely.

He calls the deal a fraud.

Inhofe also says the results of the mid-term elections repudiated the president’s policy agenda on such issues as climate change and that, by golly, he’s going to roll those policies back once he becomes chairman of the Senate environment panel.

I’ll add as an aside that there’s a certain irony in handing over the chairmanship of a key congressional environmental committee to someone who keeps dismissing the notion that Earth’s climate is changing and that there just might be a human cause to much of the warming that’s occurring — the current bitter cold snap that’s gripped much of the nation notwithstanding.

Obama said this in announcing the agreement in Beijing: “As the world’s two largest economies, energy consumers and emitters of greenhouse gases, we have a special responsibility to lead the global effort against climate change.”

And we have this, then, from House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy: “The president appears to be undeterred by the American people’s clear repudiation of his policies of more regulations and higher energy costs.”

Higher energy costs? McCarthy needs to ponder the ongoing trend in fossil fuel prices. They’ve gone down, Mr. Majority Leader.

I get that China doesn’t engender a lot of trust among many Americans. Count me as one who is skeptical of Beijing’s commitment to do what it promises to do.

At least we’ve got them on the record to cut carbon gases. Let’s hold them to that pledge.

 

environmental news, local news, State news

Water: We cannot live without it

Public television is, by definition, supposed to educate viewers as well as entertain them.

That’s how I’ve always understood public TV’s role. Well, on Thursday night, Texas Panhandle public TV viewers are going to get an education about something many of us have taken for granted.

It’s about water. How we acquire it. The value it brings to our economic infrastructure. Its future use. Ways to preserve and conserve it.

Now for a bit of disclosure. I had a teeny-tiny hand in this project. I was a reporter for a segment that Panhandle PBS assembled for this project, which was done in conjunction with other public TV stations around the state.

The program, “Texas Perspective: Water,” airs at 7 p.m. on Panhandle PBS. That’s Channel 3 for cable users; Channel 2 if you don’t have cable in the Texas Panhandle.

The program will air throughout the state because it is a state issue. Every region of Texas has reason to be concerned about the future of its water. Some regions are doing a better job of managing this resource than other regions.

I don’t want to give any of this special away here, on this blog post.

Instead, I merely want to call attention to an important public affairs program that will remind Texans from Hartley to Harlingen and from El Paso to Orange that water is absolutely critical to our survival.

It doesn’t get any more educational than that.

business news, environmental news, State news

Keep falling, fuel prices

It’s been a strange past couple of weeks around the Texas Panhandle as the price of gasoline drops — occasionally several times during the day.

It’s $2.88 per gallon for regular unleaded gas as of this morning. It’s likely to fall even more, perhaps even today.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/money/cramer-oil-hit-by-perfect-storm/ar-BB9eoxV

CNBC economics analyst Jim “The Screamer” Cramer thinks the price of crude could fall to $70 per barrel. If that happens, he says, we could see a “concerted decline” in oil production.

I’m not too worried about that decline. The energy market’s reaction to many factors is encouraging on a number of fronts.

* Supply is exceeding demand, which means Americans are a bit less gluttonous about oil consumption than we used to be.

* Alternative energy sources are replacing petroleum and coal to fire such things as electrical power plants. Natural gas exploration is way up, including in the Panhandle and throughout West Texas. Natgas burns cleaner and more efficiently, correct?

* Automakers are having to produce more fuel-efficient motor vehicles, which has had an impact on consumption. Hey, weren’t those new fuel-efficiency standards supposed to spell doom for the auto industry? Isn’t that what some in Congress protested?

I’m less worried now than I might have been two decades ago. Americans hadn’t yet absorbed the message about fuel conservation. We seem to be getting it now.

environmental news, national news, political news, State news

'P' offers a pleasant surprise

Politicians occasionally surprise me — pleasantly so.

Sometimes I draw conclusions about politicians, only to have them suggest I might have been a bit too quick on the trigger.

George P. Bush has been, well, one of those pleasant surprises as he runs for Texas land commissioner.

It turns out that the tea party wing of the Republican Party with which he has aligned himself might be gnashing its teeth over P’s environmental policies. As land commissioner, environmental protection goes with the territory.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/08/31/george-p-bush-interview/

P, the grandson of President George H.W. Bush, nephew of George W. Bush, son of Jeb Bush and a darling of the more conservative wing of the Republican Party, turns out to be keenly aware of some issues that interest those of us who tilt the other direction.

The young man acknowledges the Earth’s climate is change, that it’s getting warmer; he likes the idea of developing alternative energy sources, such as wind and solar power; he stops short of calling for abolishing the Environmental Protection Agency; he’s concerned about protecting coastal wetlands; he wants the state to use less coal and use more natural gas to fire electrical power plants.

This guy just might be OK if he gets elected. In a state that leans so far toward the GOP, that event is a near-certainty.

The land commissioner has other responsibilities as well, such as administering the state’s veteran home loan program. On that score, I give the incumbent Commissioner Jerry Patterson and his immediate predecessor David Dewhurst loads of credit. P likely will need to study up on the impact the program has on prospective homebuyers.

I’ve long thought of the land commissioner, though, as one of the state’s chief environment stewards. The office’s very name suggests that protecting “the land” is its top priority.

On that score, George P. Bush is sounding more reasonable than his tea party affiliation would suggest.

I presume he’ll know that many Texans — including yours truly — will be watching him to ensure he stays true to his stated beliefs about our environment.

We’ve only got one planet, P. We need to take care of it.