This is the 494th edition of the Spotlight on Green News & Views (previously known as the Green Diary Rescue) usually appears twice a week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Here is the April 1 Green Spotlight. More than 26,790 environmentally oriented stories have been rescued to appear in this series since 2006. Inclusion of a story in the Spotlight does not necessarily indicate my agreement with or endorsement of it.
OUTSTANDING GREEN STORIES
terrypinder writes—Some random-a** stuff on infrastructure, cause it's Wednesday: “2. Human beings have an average round-trip commute time that's universal, going back to the Neolithic. That time is one hour. No, really, it's true. It's called Marchetti's constant (although Cesare Marchetti attributes the finding to someone else--Yacov Zahavi, a transportation engineer who worked for the World Bank). How we travel may change, and how we plan our towns and cities may change, but this constant remains remarkably consistent. One can see this even in US Census data---the average American one-way commute is about 28 minutes and this really has not changed since these data have been collected. Data from the (for now) United Kingdom also confirms this. Japan has an extreme example of this. The bullet train has turned much of Honshu into a Tokyo suburb (and Honshu is not small), because what's an hour out from the city center is so much more distant. Please note that these are averages. It is a popular topic in transport journalism about the horrors of mega commutes when the data in reality shows only a minority of folks have these commutes.”
Pakalolo writes—Study: 'Completely unlivable'-Heating of the Earth pushing humans and other species to the brink: “’Human society has yet to appreciate the implications of unprecedented species redistribution for life on Earth, including for human lives. Even if greenhouse gas emissions stopped today, the responses required in human systems to adapt to the most serious effects of climate-driven species redistribution would be massive. Meeting these challenges requires governance that can anticipate and adapt to changing conditions, as well as minimize negative consequences’. Study author’s conclusion. [...] The Earth currently has a severe fever due to greenhouse gases which have been trapped in the atmosphere as a result of our burning of fossil fuels. The earth will continue to warm for some time even if greenhouse gas emissions are somehow magically eliminated. Some species, primarily microorganisms and invertebrates with short generation times (defined as the ‘average time between two consecutive generations in the lineage of a population’), might be able to adapt to changing conditions or evolve in response to climate change. But for many species, especially those that are already rare and inhabit limited meteorological conditions such as temperature, wind and precipitation and are specific to a certain region, the rising fever poses an overwhelming challenge. ”
CRITTERS AND THE GREAT OUTDOORS
Kestrel writes—Dawn Chorus: Birds Who Sing, Dance and Make Us Laugh: “I thought that today would be a good day to step out in a little different way from our usual Dawn Chorus fare, so I’m sharing some enlightening, interesting and fun videos for your enjoyment. You may have seen this first video before since it’s been widely shared. It’s a fascinating look at the mating dance of one of the many amazing species of Birds of Paradise found in New Guinea. If you haven’t seen it before, it’s a feast for the eyes.”
OceanDiver writes—The Daily Bucket - sunny interlude with big birds: “Weather today is overcast, as most days have been this spring in the Pacific Northwest. It was so nice to see even a partly sunny sky a few days ago....a brief interlude of partial sun between a cloudy morning and evening. I went out for a bicycle ride to enjoy it. Down at the bay I saw a big flock of buffleheads with a few mergansers and goldeneyes pootling around on the calm water. Then all at once everybody took off — When that happens, I look up. It usually means (if it’s not a boater coming in) that an eagle is flying overhead. And indeed — there it was. But with a Glaucous-winged gull in noisy pursuit. These are both big birds: the eagle with a 7 foot wingspan, the gull with a 4.5 foot wingspan. Gulls can be aggressive, even against larger birds like eagles and turkey vultures, when they feel put upon...for whatever reason. Someone in my previous bucket about the fighting gulls on the beach suggested that maybe they just didn’t like each other. That’s entirely possible, and maybe the best explanation for attacking for no apparent reason (such as food or nesting).”
Angmar writes—The Daily Bucket:Spring- California,& Lake Ontario area, NY: Photo diary.
Idlemoments writes—Mississippi Headwaters: Itasca State Park Photo Diary: “Minnesota’s Itasca State Park is one of the crown jewels of a state with an abundance of magnificent parks and wilderness areas. With its old-growth red and white pine forest, the headwaters of the mighty Mississippi and many other things to see and do, Itasca never disappoints.Established in 1891, Itasca is Minnesota's first state park, created to protect the forests and waters surrounding the headwaters of the Mississippi. The park’s 33,000 acres, 100 lakes and headwaters exist today as public lands thanks to the far-sighted efforts of historian, anthropologist and land surveyor Jacob V. Brower. Brower originally came to the area to settle the dispute of the actual location of the Mississippi Headwaters. He saw this region being quickly transformed by logging, and was determined to protect some of the pine forests for future generations. Through his efforts, the pine forest surrounding Lake Itasca were preserved by the Minnesota State Legislature by a margin of just one vote.”
owktree writes—Welcome to the sixteenth entry in our Backyard Science “Alphabet” series. Today’s Bucket is brought to you by the letter “P”: Photo Diary. “Welcome to the sixteenth entry in our Backyard Science ‘Alphabet’ series. Today’s Bucket is brought to you by the letter ‘P’.”
owktree writes—Daily Bucket: Overcast Day at Tinicum: “A visit to the John Heinz NWR at Tinicum in south Philadelphia on an overcast and cool Saturday. Wanted to see what ducks were passing through. But, as always, there are surprising things to find. My normal loop is a ~5 mile walk that goes around the main impoundment pond. This includes a boardwalk crossing the pond near its north end; going through some woods that is the hangout of the migrating warblers and other woodland birds; passing along some marshy margin areas and subsidiary ponds; and then coming back via some raised ground that divides the pond from the freshwater marsh and Darby Creek. A nice mix of environments to walk through.”
CLIMATE CHAOS
Mark Sumner writes—Levels of carbon are turning the atmosphere into a time machine—in the worst way possible: “The Earth during the early Eocene was an alien planet. Massive crocodiles prowled the warm waters off Greenland, hundreds of miles above the Arctic Circle, while palm trees grew in what’s now Alaska. Long, slender whales swam through oceans that were almost 200 feet higher than they are today. It was a time of tiny mammals and snakes longer than a bus. It was the world where birds eat horses. And now, in a sense, that world is coming back. Continuing to burn fossil fuels at the current rate could bring atmospheric carbon dioxide to its highest concentration in 50 million years, jumping from about 400 parts per million now to more than 900 parts per million by the end of this century, a new study warns. While it’s beyond unlikely that Gastornis will be showing up to trot around suburban lawns in pursuit of pets, the temperatures and the shorelines that came with the Eocene’s extremely high temperatures are almost certainly on their way if emissions continue unchecked.”
xaxnar writes—Smoking Gun: Climate Change -> Jet Stream -> Extreme Weather: “Olive Heffernan at New Scientist has a story on research findings which link rising temperatures to shifts in the jet stream: Diversion brings havoc. The latest work on this, published this week, is led by climatologist Michael Mann at Pennsylvania State University. It bolsters the idea that the polar jet stream can be diverted by global warming, potentially bringing weather-related havoc to the northern hemisphere in spring and summer. This high-altitude, fast-flowing atmospheric river usually follows a set route, driven by the Earth’s rotation and by temperature differences between the equator and the poles. But the Arctic is now warming faster than any other part of the planet, lessening this temperature gradient. This can cause the polar jet stream to get stuck in an unusual, slower-moving, more meandering pattern. When that happens, sometimes for weeks at a time, a persistent weather event such as flooding or drought is more likely.”
xaxnar writes—BBC Shows How Climate Change is Happening NOW in Miami Beach: “BBC Future has a grim look at what is happening now in Florida: Miami’s Fight Against Rising Seas. Not a hundred years from now. Not 50 or 30 — now. The first time my father’s basement flooded, it was shortly after he moved in. The building was an ocean-front high-rise in a small city north of Miami called Sunny Isles Beach. The marble lobby had a waterfall that never stopped running; crisp-shirted valets parked your car for you. For the residents who lived in the more lavish flats, these cars were often BMWs and Mercedes. But no matter their value, the cars all wound up in the same place: the basement. When I called, I’d ask my dad how the building was doing. ‘The basement flooded again a couple weeks ago,’ he’d sometimes say. Or: ‘It’s getting worse.’ It’s not only his building: he’s also driven through a foot of water on a main road a couple of towns over and is used to tiptoeing around pools in the local supermarket’s car park. Ask nearly anyone in the Miami area about flooding and they’ll have an anecdote to share. Many will also tell you that it’s happening more and more frequently. The data backs them up. The article by Amanda Ruggeri is a wide-ranging look at Miami Beach and the surrounding areas as rising seas bring more and more King tides, low lying areas can’t drain, streets flood, sea walls fail, and more.”
Mark Sumner writes—On climate change, Scott Pruitt follows the lead of Vladimir Putin: “Just ask ‘what generates the greatest profit for existing CEOs of existing corporations without one thought to how it affects workers, the public, or the future’ and it’s easy to predict the right’s position on almost any subject. Don’t let thoughts of improving technology, shifting needs, or any trend longer than a week interfere. All that information is discarded. To disseminate these positions, the right depends on strong leaders to set the guidelines that the rest will follow. On climate change, leadership’s position is clear. Vladimir Putin has said humans are not to blame for climate change - and that the melting of the ice in the Arctic could be used for Russia's ‘economic ends.’ Yes, yes, there may be less ice here and there, and winters may be warmer but … that’s a good thing. Certainly not the fault of humans that pump 10 billion tons of carbon into the atmosphere annually.”
ClimateDenierRoundup writes—Free Market Advocates Give Away Denial Book, But Will Teachers Buy the Propaganda? “As reported by Frontline’s Katie Worth last week, Heartland has started sending thousands of teachers across the country copies of a DVD and its book ‘Why scientists disagree about global warming.’ (Free pdf download here, or inside it says you can pay between $8.95 and $14.95 per copy, depending on how many you order...) Now, given that science teachers tend to not be complete idiots, this isn’t going to be taken at face value by teachers (as evidenced by Washington Post Angela Fritz’s poll of her social media followers). One environmental science teacher from South Carolina put it perfectly: ‘The Heartland Institute is about as good at putting teacher materials together as they are at interpreting science. Not seeing many educators being convinced by any of that hot mess. [...]So we’re inclined to agree with Greg Laden’s suggestion that ‘this was a huge waste of money and effort.’ Because at the bulk price of $8.95, some sucker gave Heartland a pretty penny to distribute 200,000 copies to teachers across the country. Just think about what that could have paid for instead- a lot of school supplies for underfunded teachers.”
ClimateDenierRoundup writes—Lack of Facts Shouldn’t Hold You Back from Talking Smack, Say Denier Flacks: “Last week, Dr. David Whitehouse, advisor to the UK’s premier climate denial shop, GWPF, made a shockingly frank admission in a comment to a Parliamentary report on science communications and the media. Apparently, Whitehouse thinks freedom of speech includes ‘misleading the public by making factually inaccurate statements.’ Given that GWPF had to spin off a political advocacy arm after the Charity Commission determined it was blurring the line between education and political spin, this quote is surprising only in its honesty. DeSmogUK’s Mat hope reports a couple of other details from Whitehouse’s comments. For one, he failed to disclose his affiliation with GWPF- what’re you ashamed of, David? And then, cementing his anti-science position, Whitehouse argued that the media gives ‘too much authority to papers published in peer-reviewed journals.’ Fortunately, the House of Commons' Science and Technology committee ignored Whitehouse’s plea to protect lies in its ‘Science Communication Inquiry.’ Instead, the final report, which focuses on how science is reported in the media, quotes actual scientists and experts, like those at the Royal Society and Science Media Center.”
rktect writes—The Arctic Sea Ice Reduction since 1978 is 4 x10^6 km2 half of which is since 2016: “Its true that not all the sea ice is gone yet, but much of what remains is thin enough that the light passing through it is allowing algae blooms. In many places it is cracked and subject to being broken up by storms which due to the extremes of heat and cold confronting eachother in that region have extremes of wind and wave. [...] The Jacobshaven Glacier delivering 10% of the ice melt from Greenlands ice caps to the sea no longer flows at a glacial pace but rather is retreating at 10 km/yr with the rate of retreat increasing at an increasing rate just as with the sea ice. Instead of climate changing over millennia we are now seeing it change in ways we can observe with our own eyes in the course of a season. Even as some scientists are still looking at what happened during the second half of the 20th century at a scale of change over decades others are beginning to address the significant acceleration of changes observed year by year.”
7th term is small writes—Yale Climate Opinion Maps: “Darksyde’s March 3rd “This week in science” post included a reference to the Yale Climate Opinion Maps which are worth a little time and can be found here. The maps show what you would expect. Larger percentages of the population in urban areas believe global warming is happening. Smaller percentages in rural areas. There is a Latino effect (which I heard about on NPR). As a group, Hispanics take climate change seriously and it shows on the maps. The maps can viewed by state, county or congressional district. I found the congressional district view to be the most interesting because it turns out there is not a single congressional district where the majority believes global warming isn’t happening. Or, to restate without the double negative, (which will make my sister the English teacher happy), a majority in every congressional district in the United States believe climate change is happening. This means different things to different people. To me it means I haven’t entirely wasted the last 15 years of my life (I am a science teacher). To a climate change denier, it means he is losing or perhaps has lost the battle for American public opinion.”
OCEANS, WATER, DROUGHT
Dartagnan writes—Trump Threatens to Kill The Chesapeake Bay: “The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in North America, with more than 150 major rivers and streams flowing into its basin, extended into six states. Its name may derive from the Algonquin Chesepioc, which refers to a village at a ‘big river,’ or from the native Chesepians or Chesapeakes, who inhabited the area now known as South Hampton Roads in Virginia. The Bay is a prime tourist attraction for fishing, sailing, swimming, kayaking, and is well-known for its seafood production, mainly blue crabs, clams and oysters. As a major link in the Intracoastal Waterway of inlets, rivers, bays and sounds that form a navigable route down the Eastern seaboard, it contributes mightily to the commerce as well as the ecology of the region. Its preservation should be a point of pride for all Americans who care about this country’s natural beauty. But as beautiful as it is, the Bay has had its problems. Just six years ago nearly one-third of the Bay was afflicted with a springtime “dead zone” of oxygen-starved water resulting from fertilizer and chemical runoff. The damage to aquatic life was staggering—96% of the oyster harvest disappeared along with over half of the crab harvest, as huge areas of the bay entered into a human-induced ‘death spiral.’”
Lib Dem FoP writes—New Filter Removes Salt from Sea Water: “Desalination plants are expensive and demand large amounts of power to remove salt from sea water. A new invention could replace that. The National Graphene Institute at the University of Manchester, England has announced that their scientists have developed a filter that removes salt from sea water. Previously graphene sheet filters failed because the tiny holes expanded in water to allow the salt to pass. Graphene-oxide membranes developed at the National Graphene Institute have already demonstrated the potential of filtering out small nanoparticles, organic molecules, and even large salts. Until now, however, they couldn’t be used for sieving common salts used in desalination technologies, which require even smaller sieves. Previous research at The University of Manchester found that if immersed in water, graphene-oxide membranes become slightly swollen and smaller salts flow through the membrane along with water, but larger ions or molecules are blocked.”
WILDERNESS, NATIONAL FORESTS AND PARKS & OTHER PUBLIC LANDS
OWCH writes—Is Trump's "paycheck donation" to the National Park service all wrong? “Yeah, the PussyGrabber-in-Chief followed through on ONE (maybe), maybe one campaign promise, to donate his POTUS salary. Although $78k is a lot of money to most people, it’s a drop in the bucket for him. Too bad he can’t write a check and make RussiaGate, TrumpRyanCare, and every other broken promise he made go way just as easily. Anyways, take a look at the check above, of the so-called ‘proof’ of honoring his commitment. I am not an accountant, just a regular schmuck that’s written a check or two in my time. • Why is it written directly the National Park Service? Can you even send money directly to a Department? Every time I write a check to the government (a lot this time of year), it goes directly to the United States Treasury, who is then responsible for disbursing funds. From the NPS’ donation page, there are lots of ways to give. But none of them say, ‘write a check to us and mail it to us!’ •Speaking of mailing a check, what’s that address? Google it. Doesn’t exist. Am I missing something here? I’d be more than happy to scrub this diary but I figured all Kossacks onboard can figure this out, crowdsource my questions.”
ENERGY
Fossil Fuels
Dan Bacher writes—Consumer Group Says Oil Industry, Not Consumers, Should Pay New Gas Tax: “Governor Jerry Brown and legislative leaders hail the Governor’s plan to fix roads, freeways and bridges across California as a ‘landmark transportation investment,’ but a prominent consumer group today said Brown’s gas tax to fix roads should come out of oil companies’ windfall profits — and ‘not out of consumers’ wallets.’ Brown, at a press conference with Senate President pro Tempore Kevin de León, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and labor, business and local leaders on March 30, claimed the $5 billion-a-year program will cost most drivers less than $10 a month and comes with ‘strict new accountability provisions to ensure funds can only be spent on transportation.’ ‘California has a massive backlog of broken infrastructure that has been neglected far too long,’ said Governor Brown. ‘Fixing the roads will not get cheaper by waiting – or ignoring the problem. This is a smart plan that will improve the quality of life in California.’ [...] While acknowledging the urgent need to fix California’s roads, Liza Tucker of the Santa Monica-Based Consumer Watchdog said the funds for repairing California roads should come from the oil companies’ windfall profits and not from consumers.”
Hydraulic Fracturing
Meteor Blades writes—Pennsylvania judge tosses out jury's verdict and $4.24 million damages award in fracking lawsuit: “A U.S. magistrate judge has rejected a jury’s March 2016 decision to award more than $4 million to two families in Dimock, Pennsylvania, who claimed their well water had been tainted by methane released from underground rock formations by hydraulic fracturing—fracking. Concluding among other things that the scientific evidence presented in court was contradictory and didn’t back up the claims of damage, Judge Martin Carlson sent the case back for retrial. But first, he stated, the two families should work with the company—Cabot Oil & Gas—to arrive at a settlement. Of the 40 families who sued Cabot in 2009, these two are the only ones who have not settled. [...] In fact, the court barred a considerable amount of evidence of water contamination from being shown to the jury. One such bit was a consent decree from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. It labeled Cabot responsible for methane migration as a consequence of defective construction of the drilling well.”
REGULATIONS & PROTECTIONS
Lefty Coaster writes—Fox's Chris Wallace asks Scott Pruitt tough questions about the EPA's role gets evasion, distortion: “Scott Pruitt has devoted his career to shielding and protecting big polluters from national environmental laws. That makes his appointment to head the EPA extremely suspect. He doesn’t believe in the EPA’s mission despite his platitudes to the contrary. Pruitt is trying to butcher his agency by a whopping 31%. Pruitt was interviewed on Fox News Sunday by Chris Wallace. [...] ‘New EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt embarrassed himself repeatedly on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace, who kept Pruitt on the hot seat for 14 minutes as he pressed to get past Pruitt's paper-thin talking points,’ Jeremy Symons of the nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund wrote for the Huffington Post. Symons went on to fact-check Pruitt's statistics, noting that while the CO2 reductions he cited were accurate, they mostly occurred during the Obama administration as a result of the former president's clean-energy plans.”
ClimateDenierRoundup writes—Pruitt’s Prudent Endangerment Position Endangering His Position at EPA: “’The knives are out for [interchangeable white man]’ has become the new Mad Lib of the Trump administration. Between Flynn, Priebus, Cohn and Kushner, internal competition is rampant, with warring factions clawing at one another until one emerges from the fray less bloodied and bruised than others, and that’s who Trump listens to. This, it has been said, is his style. So far, no one has put Pruitt in the Mad Lib. But they soon will. The rift is growing between the Bannonites in the Trump administration, who favor literal scorched earth policies like pulling out of Paris and undoing the endangerment finding, and the more “moderate” folks who don’t want to try to tackle solid science and instead focus on promoting fossil fuels in other ways. Amazingly, Pruitt seems to be falling on the sane side, reportedly arguing against taking on the endangerment finding as part of last week’s executive order. The torch-bearer for the Bannonites is James Delingpole, who criticized Pruitt last week and again on Sunday in light of his awful performance in an interview with Chris Wallace at Fox News. To give credit where it’s very rarely due, Wallace’s Fox News interview of Pruitt was refreshingly hard-hitting. Wallace opened with the thousands of deaths the Clean Power Plan would prevent, and pressed Pruitt to give real answers on everything from human causation to China’s commitment to the Paris Agreement.”
Mokurai writes—Trump's Environment EO Blows Itself Out of the Water: “Two provisions in Trump's recent Executive Order on the environment contradict everything he tried to accomplish in it. (d) It further is the policy of the United States that, to the extent permitted by law, all agencies should take appropriate actions to promote clean air and clean water for the American people, while also respecting the proper roles of the Congress and the States concerning these matters in our constitutional republic. (e) It is also the policy of the United States that necessary and appropriate environmental regulations comply with the law, are of greater benefit than cost, when permissible, achieve environmental improvements for the American people, and are developed through transparent processes that employ the best available peer-reviewed science and economics. IOW, Trump has logic-bombed himself, as they describe it at TV Tropes, and his head will soon be exploding.”
ECO-ACTION & ECO JUSTICE
SusanCStrong writes—Framing Our March Signs to Persuade: “Now I know that when it comes to actually making signs for a march, self-expression, general feistiness and exuberance come to the fore. After all, seeing what other people have written is a major form of entertainment as your march slowly pokes along. The wittiest or the most outrageous may even garner mainstream media attention and certainly a place on social media. And it’s true that for folks who strongly disagree with the focus of a march in the first place, it doesn’t matter what your signs say. They won’t be moved. But let’s back up a bit here and look at what strategic framing requires. Let’s consider who the audiences are for our march signs. First, it’s the D.C. politicians. Then it may well be the people who voted for Trump when Bernie was driven out. Add to that those who used to be Democrats but voted for Trump out of disgust with the party’s policies re trade, jobs, and its habit of cozying up to the 1%. To get real change, we must bring a great many more of these Americans on board our freedom train too.”
MISCELLANY
Walter Einenkel writes—New York judge dismisses ExxonMobil's attempt to block climate change fraud case: “ExxonMobil has just received more bad news concerning its ongoing climate change fraud cause with attorney generals from New York, Massachusetts and the U.S. Virgin Islands. A couple of days ago, the oil giant’s attempts to get the trial moved to their considerably more friendly home territory of Texas was denied, and before that ExxonMobil’s ace-in-the-hole former CEO Rex Tillerson’s ‘shadow’ emails were ordered released by a New York Judge. Today, even more good news. A lawsuit by ExxonMobil seeking to block climate change fraud investigations by the attorneys general of Massachusetts and New York has been dismissed—at least for now. The ruling came from the New York federal judge who took over the case last week after a judge in Texas transferred it to her jurisdiction. Although the order by U.S. District Court Judge Valerie Caproni puts an end to the lawsuit filed by Exxon in Texas last year, the case may be refiled in as little as a month. The ongoing case concerns what ExxonMobil knew about climate change and fossil fuel’s part in global warming—and for how long.”
SkepticalRaptor writes—A review of state's anti-science legislation: “I thought it would be beneficial for us to take a look at the states that are pushing anti-science legislation since the November 2016 election, when a lot of state legislatures’ composition changed (or remained the same). In general, this legislation focuses on anti-evolution and anti-climate change beliefs pushed by the right wing. [...] The Idaho House of Representatives adopted Senate Concurrent Resolution 121 (SCR 121) that deletes five science education standards for Idaho students – the most troubling were those that focused on climate change and human impact on the environment. The reasoning for this anti-science legislation was that the current standards fail to present ‘both sides of the debate.’ Climate change is only a political debate, the science has been established by mountains of evidence.”
Weakly Political writes—A Coal Christmas in March: “Since Trump was elected, it's been like Christmas came early for the coal and oil industries. They get loosened regulations and free reign to pollute... and we get asthma, dirty water, and devastated ecosystems. Hell, maybe we'll at least get a white Christmas in California! In July. Or earlier.”
Tankman46 writes—Political Limerick - Bringing back coal:
“Trump said that we're bringing back coal
And that is his number one goal
Cuz' warming's a hoax
To fool honest folks
And Santa lives at the North Pole.”