This is the 485th 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 Feb. 22 Green Spotlight. More than 26,520 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
RockyMtnHigh writes—Trump ignores Supreme Court ruling in EO to roll back Clean Water Act protection: “Many had expected Trump to roll back Obama’s Clean Water Rule and revert to the Bush-era rule which relied on Justice Kennedy’s controlling decision in the 4-1-4 split decision in the 2006 Rapanos case — requiring that for a water to be covered under the Clean Water Act’s jurisdiction it must have a ‘significant nexus’ with navigable waters. The Obama rule relied on that same legal standard but used an extensive scientific review to determine that broad classes of tributary streams and wetlands that are hydrologically connected to navigable waters but that do not flow year round do indeed have a ‘significant nexus’ and are covered by the Clean Water Act. But President Trump’s Executive Order doesn’t just start the process of repealing the Obama-era rule — he goes further and directs his agencies to consider using the minority standard espoused by the late Justice Scalia in the Rapanos case. Scalia’s approach would limit the Clean Water Act’s reach to perennial streams and lakes — those that (essentially) flow or are present all the time — and to the wetlands with direct surface flow consistently connecting them to those perennial streams or lakes where the boundary between stream and wetland is difficult to discern. He would remove from the Clean Water Act’s reach the seasonal and intermittent streams that represent about 60% of stream miles nationwide, and in my home state of Colorado are 75% of our stream miles.”
gmoke writes—Community Supported Agriculture [CSA] Charter for USA and Canada: “Community supported agriculture (CSA) began in the USA in the 1980s in New England. In a CSA, customers buy shares in the produce of a local farm before growing season and receive a bundle of foodstuffs and agricultural products regularly as the harvest comes in. Anthony Graham, a farmer for over 30 years at the Temple-Wilton Community Farm in New Hampshire, one of the original CSAs, said, ‘When we started the Temple Wilton Community Farm, we were interested in community and in the “culture” of agriculture. What we were attempting to set up was a way for a community of people to support the existence of a farm through good times and bad by making pledges of financial support over the course of one year. By agreeing to support the existence of the farm our members became co-farmers.’ Today, there are over 7,500 healthy, sustainable community farms working in the USA, and thousands more in Canada.”
CRITTERS AND THE GREAT OUTDOORS
jazr writes—Daily Bucket: Cycles of Life -- Death and Rebirth: “Here in the Hudson Valley, like many parts of the country, we have experienced unusual warmth. The last two days were in the high teens (60s in Fahrenheit). As a result, the snow has melted. I did my usual walk around the property this AM, and did not expect to find much of interest. Last night there was an extreme thunderstorm — in February! — and power was out for awhile. I was really curious about the rate of flow into the pond, so I headed towards the inlet to inspect. Wow, I thought, what is that? Probably a raccoon, given the shape of the head and the specificity of the tail.”
estreya writes—Saturday Morning Garden Blogging, Vol. 13.08: The Sculptures of Nature ... “’What a surprise to see rain at the end of February,; said no one in the Pacific Northwest, ever. It's still quite cold here, and very, very wet. But i actually enjoy this time of year, when the grays of winter can act as a canvass for the slowly emerging colors of Spring. This transition becomes increasingly apparent along the trails in the back woods, where mossy mounds and fallen stumps stand like sculptures among the naked trees. Shall we grab our rubber boots and have a look around at some of my favorite shapes?”
OceanDiver writes—The Daily Bucket - delightful ducks of winter: “When somebody is grumbling about winter to me around here, I have to say But what about the ducks? How could you hate winter when you are graced with these multitudes of delightful ducks who are only here between November and April? How can you be longing for the empty bays of summer? Usually I get a funny look, or eyes glaze over. But I know you folks here at Backyard Science understand. :) While I celebrate signs of spring like everyone, buds swelling and frogs chorusing, I also feel a bit of sadness knowing the ducks will be departing in a month or two. So let’s celebrate some ducks today. These are some of the wonderful ducks I’ve been seeing lately.”
matching mole writes—Dawn Chorus: Wakulla Springs Boat Tour: “Greetings fellow Dawn Chorusers. “Today’s DC is just a few photos I took last weekend while taking a prospective graduate student on a tour of our local natural wonders. The only photos I took at St Marks NWR (it was raining) were of this Vermillion Flycatcher. They are rare but regular at St Marks in the winter, quite a long way to the east of their breeding range. This is a super cropped photo. When we moved on to Wakulla Springs State Park and its wonderful boat tour. A great way to see some of Florida’s iconic aquatic critters up close and personal. The tour covers a mile of the river in which no other boats are allowed and there is essentially no human disturbance other than the tour. The animals are abundant and habituated to the boat.”
PHScott writes—The Daily Bucket: Billy Burn - 2017 version: “Not much to say about the annual controlled burning of the North Florida woods. When travelling from Tallahassee to Pensacola weekend before, it was smoke in the air all the way there and back. National Forests, State Forests, Air Force bases, and private landowners -- all get into the season of fire. I’ve posted buckets before with more background here and then last year at Spring Canyon. Sunday we were in western Gadsden County for Billy and Marcia and their restoration efforts. It had not been burned since March 2014 so on the edges, the transition from pine to hardwood, the encroaching hardwood that fire will keep out, it needed some brush-cutting first. The rest had ample fuel from needles, wiregrass, broomsedge, and weeds.”
CLIMATE CHAOS
Angmar writes—The recent 2017 warm spell (and what does it indicate about possible climate change acceleration): “It might feel good, but February’s intense heat is a very bad sign.The United States hits record high temps, as a climate change denier takes the reigns at the EPA. Meteorologists expect to see dozens of heat records broken this week, as an extended stretch of uncommonly warm weather continues across much of the United States. Also this week, Scott Pruitt took the helm at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Pruitt, who has deep ties to the fossil fuel industry, has described climate science as a “religious belief” and said he expects to scrap the Clean Power Plan, an EPA initiative to limit carbon pollution from power plants.”
subtropolis writes—Video: Shell Oil's 1991 stark warning of climate change: “From The Guardian: ‘Shell knew’: oil giant's 1991 film warned of climate change danger. Shell’s 28-minute film, called Climate of Concern, was made for public viewing, particularly in schools and universities. It warned of extreme weather, floods, famines and climate refugees as fossil fuel burning warmed the world. The serious warning was “endorsed by a uniquely broad consensus of scientists in their report to the United Nations at the end of 1990,’ the film noted. ‘If the weather machine were to be wound up to such new levels of energy, no country would remain unaffected,’ it says. ‘Global warming is not yet certain, but many think that to wait for final proof would be irresponsible. Action now is seen as the only safe insurance.’”
xircon writes—Just like ExxonMobil, Shell knew of its contribution to climate change decades ago: “This is consistent with what we already know about ExxonMobil’s knowledge of fossil fuel’s effects on climate change since the late 1970s. The industry has claimed that it was still uncertain of the effects at the time. In truth, as scientific certainty grew, the oil industry began investing heavily in climate skepticism and denial. As expensive lawsuits loom, one of the industry’s main goals today is to discredit groups revealing this history of unethical behavior. Much like the tobacco industry before it, the fossil fuel industry still has much to answer for.”
ClimateDenierRoundup writes—Pruitt’s Private Emails Bad, Scientist’s Public Participation good: “Hey, remember that time the GOP and climate deniers made a huge stink over an ex-EPA administrator using a private email address? Or all those times deniers sued for climate scientists’ emails? Or the time the GOP made a massive fuss over a presidential candidate’s emails? They, apparently, do not. Because despite explicitly telling the Senate during his confirmation hearing that he never used a personal email account for state business, the Oklahoma attorney’s general office has confirmed that Scott Pruitt... used a personal email account to conduct state business. We eagerly await the months of investigations, hearings and op-eds to discuss this circumvention of transparency laws and abuse of process.”
Egberto Willies writes—Fox News Tucker Carlson implodes as Bill Nye The Science Guy schooled him on climate change: “Bill Nye, The Science Guy, kept his cool as his well-designed answers to Tucker Carlson's 'gotcha' questions caused the host to lose it. Bill Nye came very prepared to confront one of Fox News' biggest blowhards. He kept his cool with circumspect answers that caused Carlson to flip out as seen in this excerpted video. After several minutes of setup and back and forth, Tucker Carlson asked Bill Nye a very specific question. Bill Nye's answer did not conform to the answer Carlson was expecting to give climate change deniers some plausibility. ‘The Climate is always changing,’ Carlson said. ‘You've conceded that.’ ‘I won't concede that,’ Bill Nye said. ‘I assert that.’”
OCEANS, WATER, DROUGHT
Dan Bacher writes—Greenwashing Extinction 2017: The Deep Links Between Delta Tunnels and Faux Marine Protection: “One of the least discussed issues in California environmental politics – and one of the most crucial to understanding Governor Jerry Brown’s Delta Tunnels Plan - is the clear connection between the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative and the California WaterFix, formerly called the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP). At a time when local, national and international mainstream media are focusing on the Oroville Dam crisis, it’s important for reporters to dig deeper and understand the context that the emergency, which spurred the evacuation of over 188,000 people in Butte, Yuba and Sutter counties, occurs within. It’s crucial to understand that these two neo-liberal processes, the MLPA Initiative and the California Water Fix, are the environmental ‘legacy’ that two Governors, Arnold Schwarznegger and Jerry Brown, have devoted their energy, staff and money to, rather than doing the mundane but necessary process of maintaining and repairing the state’s water infrastructure, including Oroville Dam.”
Meteor Blades writes—In a speech brimful of exaggeration and fabrication, Trump tells whoppers on energy and environment: “While Trump mentioned jobs nine times in his speech, not once did he point out that there are in the United States, at last count, 260,000 solar jobs and 88,000 wind jobs. In both cases, that’s more than three times as many such jobs as were employed in those fields in 2010. The numbers, some analysts say, could triple again by 2030. While Trump made one brief mention of clean air and water, he didn’t say squat about his plan to cripple the Environmental Protection Agency by whacking $2 billion from its $8 billion budget. Nor did he say anything about his expected reversal of Obama’s three-year moratorium on coal leasing of public lands. Nor his plan to get rid of President Obama’s Clean Power Plan that mandates emissions cuts in electricity-generating plants to protect people’s health and reduce the amount of carbon dioxide we’re pumping into the atmosphere to our detriment.”
CANDIDATES, STATE AND DC ECO-RELATED POLITICS
poopdogcomedy writes—RI-Sen: Sheldon Whitehouse (D), "Trump Was Childish To Ignore Climate Change In His Big Speech": “Democrats and progressive groups were appalled that President Donald Trump failed to mention climate change in his first major speech to Congress.“ I think it’s at this point just childish not to mention climate change in a world in which we’re seeing so many effects of it and one day it will be a sickening look back at the power of the fossil fuel industry over our democracy, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) told HuffPost after Tuesday’s address. ‘In Trump’s speech I did not hear one word about climate change—the single biggest threat facing our planet,’ said Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)
ban nock writes—Zinke Confirmed As Secretary of Interior: “Sixteen Dems joined Republicans in voting in Ryan Zinke as the New Secretary of Interior. Not sure how others like it but by far Zinke is Trump’s most moderate cabinet choice yet, influenced no doubt by his son a lifetime member of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers a Sportsman’s group. I’m hoping Zinke’s influence will affect the pending reform of the Endangered Species Act. I’ve read unflattering reviews of his nomination (not here necessarily). I’m not sure why someone wouldn’t like him when the alternative would be an anti public lands type.”
Brett Wilkins writes—Republican Anti-Science Bills Target School Children in 4 More States: “Republican state lawmakers in four more states, many of them adherents of a theological worldview with no basis in science, are advancing legislation allowing educators to teach ‘alternative fact’-based pseudoscience if they believe it to be scientific. Ars Technica reports on anti-science bills in Alabama, Indiana, Oklahoma and South Dakota (the latter state’s measure has now been defeated) that would protect teachers who ‘teach the controversy’ on global warming or evolution, as long as they believe the course material is scientific — even if it is based on scientifically baseless beliefs. In Alabama, House Joint Resolution 78 identifies “biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning’ as controversial topics — although there is little controversy among scientists that either evolution or anthropogenic climate change are real. The measure’s author, Republican state lawmaker Mack Butler, also pushed a similar bill in 2015 that died in committee. At the time, Butler explained his bill was meant to ‘encourage debate if a student has a problem learning he came from a monkey rather than an intelligent design,’ the nonscientific theory positing a supernatural supreme being, or ‘god,’ created all life on Earth.”
WILDERNESS, NATIONAL FORESTS AND PARKS & OTHER PUBLIC LANDS
smallfarmer writes—Trading Forests for No Jobs Will Not Make America Great: “Once again this week the Oregon Logging Conference rolled into town and set up shop at the fairgrounds. Huge equipment: skidders, log cranes, grapples, etc. Somebody always shows up with a truck full of trees too. And every year those trees are a little smaller. This year, I’d rate them somewhere between puny and not worth bothering with. I’m a longtime carpenter and cabinetmaker, smitten decades ago by the miracle and beauty embodied in the trees of this planet. So, I get the draw on some level, but this event in particular as well as the broader relationship between people and forests here in Oregon have been squatted on by a morbid sort of pathos for a long time. I think a lot of the conference attendees actually feel it too. It might be my imagination or just the gloom-funk of late winter up here in the soggy Northwest, but it just doesn’t look like there’s a lot of joy in it any longer even for them.”
BYPRODUCTS, TRASH, TOXIC & RADIOACTIVE WASTE
7th term is small writes—Burn Pits: ”The Minneapolis Star Tribune reported yesterday that Air National Guard Iraq War veteran Amie Muller died last week of pancreatic cancer. She was twice deployed at Balad Iraq, embedded with a Military Intelligence squadron. Her living quarters were close to the 10 acre base burn pit, a burn pit that was so active, it combusted perhaps as much as 100 tons of all manner of waste a day. The US military operated approximately 230 burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan until 2009, when their use was restricted. Upon returning home, Ms. Mueller began to suffer a series of illnesses generally only found in much older women. Believing at least some of her illnesses were related to the toxic brew of gases and particulates released by Balad’s burn pit, she did what she could, despite being very sick, to bring awareness of the potential heath risks associated with burn pits. The Star Tribune article is short and you can find it here. Ms. Muller’s obituary can be read here. She was 36 years old.”
ENERGY
Nuclear
Joieau writes—New York Nukes: 2 Reactors Down, 4 Still Standing: “After half a century of lawsuits, petitions, letters, public testimony and dozens of radioactive 'oopses' at the Indian Point nuclear facility just 40 miles north of Manhattan, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, Eric Schneiderman and the environmental group Riverkeeper struck a deal with Entergy last month to shut down the 2 reactors at long last. Despite expired licenses, the two operating reactors at Indian Point had been hoping to get their 20-year extensions by the time their granted 'grace' period ended, now the plants will be shut down in 2020 and 2021 and will finally stop dumping radwaste on New York City & Megaburb residents and into the Hudson River and groundwater. Entergy will provide $15 million for 'environmental restoration' of the filthy facility, which won't accomplish much in the way of cleanup. Entergy also said it would offer its employees work at other of its nuclear facilities, or re-train them for renewable technologies.”
Fossil Fuels
Sergeant T writes—The Red Canary in the West Virginia Coal Mines: “Key coal country counties in West Virginia likely served as unheeded warnings about the crumbling blue wall from Wisconsin to Pennsylvania that allowed Donald Trump to circumvent the will of the majority and assume the presidency. Ten counties* accounting for the majority of jobs and coal produced in West Virginia served as the red canary that should have alerted the Democratic Party that a susceptibility to toxic fumes from a reactionary economic populism were wafting through once reliably blue coal country. These counties located in the Mountain State’s southern coal fields have long been unflinchingly Democrat blue. The fact they all flipped red in 2012, four years before key Rust Belt counties would do the same thing, has long been attributed to a combination of racism and reliance on the un-environmentally friendly coal industry for jobs.”
Hydraulic Fracturing
EARTHWORKS writes—Fracking industry games system, regulators look the other way“: This week, the Trump Administration suggested slashing the budgets of some government agencies, in particular the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Around the same time, Earthworks--along with partners Clean Air Council, Clean Water Action, and Moms Clean Air Force--released an in-depth report showing how inadequate state oversight and enforcement of the federal Clean Air Act harms the public rather than protecting it. Permitted to Pollute: How oil and gas operators and regulators exploit clean air protections and put the public at risk, is the result of more than a year of research focusing on three natural gas processing and transmission facilities in southwestern Pennsylvania. We started the project because of a question that oil and gas field residents often ask: What exactly is going on here?”
Emissions Controls & Carbon Pricing
ClimateDenierRoundup writes—Hear All About Social Cost of Carbon in House Hearing: “Tomorrow at 10am, the House Science Space and Technology and the Oversight committees will hold a joint hearing on the Social Cost of Carbon (SCC). With two ‘so-called’ experts from Koch-funded organizations on the panel - Pat Michaels of the Cato Institute and Kevin Dayaratna of the Heritage Foundation - the presence of climate-denying industry groups will be strong. Fortunately, the other two panelists, Dr. Ted Gayer of Brookings Institute and Dr. Michael Greenstone of the University of Chicago, should be able to hold their own against this false ‘balance’ of ‘experts.’ As one of the leads who integrated the policy into the federal government’s rulemaking, Dr Greenstone probably knows as much about the SCC as anyone. His December New York Times op-ed provides a useful context for tomorrow’s hearing. (Some other useful resources for those looking to brush up on SCC are Carbon Brief’s recent lengthy and deep Q and A on the SCC, and Climate Nexus’s quick-and-dirty guide for swift factchecking/tweeting.)”
Pipelines & Other Oil and Gas Transport
ban nock writes—Pipeline Incident in Florida Results in One Shot Dead: “Organizers and members of the anti-pipeline movement were quick to condemn the suspected gunman’s actions, stressing the movement’s track record of peaceful protests. Jennifer Kramel, a 46-year-old Gainesville-based organizer, said she doesn’t believe the gunman was a protester; he may have been a disgruntled pipeline worker or a resident whose land had been seized to clear land for the pipeline.”
e2247 writes—Worker bees on Standing Rock struggling to clean Sacred Stone & other camps -- Action Item below.
REGULATIONS
Meteor Blades writes—Trump signs executive order 'paving the way' for reversing key Obama era Clean Water Act rule: “Pr*sident Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday calling for a review of the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2015 Waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule. Given the complex nature of the rule and the controversy surrounding it, that review could take a very long time. You can read a draft of the order here. There is little doubt that Trump would dump the rule outright if he could. However, the Supreme Court decided in Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Assn. v. State Farm that any decision to rescind a rule falls under the same ‘arbitrary and capricious’ test that must be met when a rule is imposed. To the small group of attendees, Trump said at the White House before he signed: ‘EPA's so-called waters of the United States rule is one of the worst examples of federal regulation, and it's truly run amok, and it's one of the rules most strongly opposed by farmers, ranchers and agricultural workers all across our land prohibiting them from being allowed to do what they are supposed to be doing. Been a disaster.’ ”
Meteor Blades writes—Pr*sident Trump's decision to erase water rule could save his golf courses money: “The Trump Organization lists 17 golf courses among its properties, including 12 in the U.S. that probably would be subject to the rule. The golf industry, along with numerous business groups, has been trying to kill the rule since before President Barack Obama finalized it in June 2015. It has been under legal challenge and so far hasn’t been put into effect. Once it takes effect, it would raise costs for golf courses. For decades, we’ve listened to people seeking public office say that government should be run like a business. Now we’ve got somebody in the presidency who is trying to do just that. Unfortunately, that somebody is trying to run government it like it is his business. Given Trump’s history, we know how that can go.”
Dan Bacher writes—Sportsmen and women slam Trump's order rolling back Clean Water Rule! “Six national conservation organizations representing sportsmen and sportswomen today issued a joint statement condemning President Trump’s executive order directing the EPA and Army Corps of Engineers to revise their 2015 Clean Water Rule, which was created to clarify protections for headwater streams and wetlands under the Clean Water Act. ‘The order directs the federal agencies to consider using former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's minority opinion, claiming that seasonal streams and many wetlands do not merit protection, as a basis for revising the rule,’ according to the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. ‘Sportsmen will not settle for watered down protections or negligence for the habitat that supports the fish and wildlife we love to pursue,’ says Whit Fosburgh, president and CEO of theTwhich joined five other leading sportsmen’s groups in issuing a joint statement of support for the benefits of the Clean Water Rule.”
ECO-ACTION & ECO JUSTICE
citisven writes—Saving the EPA from the Grave (A Protest Funeral Photo Essay): “Yesterday's Protest Funeral for EPA, the climate, and environmental justice at the EPA’s regional office in downtown San Francisco was just another little piece in the multi-dimensional grassroots movement to push back against this pitiful administration's all out assault on our most sacred civic institutions and inspire participation and creative agitation. After sending an epic message to the world from Ocean Beach a couple of weeks ago, which I haven’t gotten around to posting about but here’s a little teaser anyway the task at hand yesterday was to get together our most functional funeral attire, get a bouquet of flowers, and gather on the sidewalk to mourn the new chief’s lifeless relationship with all living things and lend our moral support to the agency’s employees who will have to endure that train wreck of a new administration first hand. As always, people amplified their sentiments with markers and cardboard. […] Of course, aside from being fun and meaningful, a mock funeral also makes for great theater, which is a pretty good recipe for attracting local media. In this case, it was ABC7 News that showed up to document the proceedings and interview participants.”
TRANSPORTATION & INFRASTRUCTURE
SummerStorm writes—Infrastructure, Tax Reform, and "Defense" Spending: “The plan to do infrastructure spending, tax reform, and ‘defense’ refurbishing and buildup has come to a full stop. But, there is still a strong natural interest in these issues. The fly in the ointment is Trump. He demands too much, doesn’t want to negotiate, and is a pain in the ass. Still, if both Democrats and Republicans want to do it, there is always a way to proceed. Currently there are a variety of opinions about the correct amount of money to spend on infrastructure or ‘defense’ spending (they are equal amounts). The low is $50 B / year for 10 years, in order to get something done, but without busting the budget or giving the administration too much money to bloat the military on silly things we don’t need. The high is $75 B / year for 10 years. There may be a believe the sticking problem is the dollar value. NO, that isn’t it. The problem is that few people trust Trump and there are legitimate differences of opinion about the level of deficit we should accept to get the benefits of the spending.”
John Chapman writes—NEPA-Freeze Part 2: Trump Still Lagging Behind Obama on Infrastructure & Extraction Projects: “What types of projects are being held back? An EIS is required for ‘major federal actions’ and, while the bar for what is ‘major’ is fairly high, courts have decided that a ton of things count as a ‘federal actions.’ Federal actions include infrastructure projects funded and designed by the federal government. A federal action also occurs when private entities conduct activities on Federal land such as building powerlines, drilling for oil, logging, expanding ski resorts, or installing renewable energy projects. Since navigable waters of the United States are under the jurisdiction of the Federal Government, projects such as constructing pipelines across rivers (even when all of the adjacent landowners are private) is considered a federal action. Courts have construed a ‘federal action’ to exist even when the only federal action is providing funds to state or private entities. Finally, federal actions also include rulemaking, creation of regulations, creation of plans or programs, and other policy or programmatic actions. For all of these ‘federal actions,’ an EIS is required if the action is ‘major.’”