Environmental News For The Week Ending 02September 2018

Written by rjs, MarketWatch 666

This is a collection of interesting news articles about the environment and related topics over the last week. This is a Tuesday evening regular post at GEI.

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China’s refusal to share virus is “scandalous… many could die needlessly” – US health experts are alarmed and outraged that the Chinese government appears to be withholding samples of the deadly, rapidly evolving bird flu virus, H7N9, from US research labs, according to a report by The New York Times. The samples are critical for studying the virus and developing life-saving treatments and vaccines in preparation for potential outbreaks or pandemics. Usually, countries share viral samples “in a timely manner” without any fanfare under an agreement established by the World Health Organization to address such potential flu threats. But according to the Times, China has failed to share the samples for more than a year, despite persistent requests from government officials and researchers, including those at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Moreover, scientists and experts worry that, as the US and China continue to butt heads on trade agreements, the issue of sharing biological samples and other medical-related materials could worsen.

Flesh-Eating Genital Infections Caused By Common Diabetes Drugs – The FDA has issued a warning over a rare form of flesh-eating bacteria which targets the genitals, caused by several widely-used diabetes medications, reports Bloomberg‘s Michelle Cortez. The condition, known as “necrotizing fasciitis of the perineum,” or Fournier’s gangrene, has only affected 12 diabetes patients over a five-year span (seven men and five women), one of whom died – so if you come down with it the support group is going to be small. Also, if you’d like to never eat again, click here (don’t do it). The drugs covered by the warning include Johnson & Johnson’s Invokana, AstraZeneca Plc’s Farxiga and Eli Lilly & Co.’s Jardiance. Known as SGLT2 inhibitors, they were approved in 2013, 2013 and 2016, respectively. The drugs help the body lower blood-sugar levels via the kidneys, and excess sugar is excreted in a patient’s urine. Urinary tract infections are a known side effect. – Bloomberg This is horrifying. Flesh-eating bacterial infection of the genitals linked to best-selling diabetes drugs (like Farxiga, Invokana and Jardiance). Just a dozen cases in the 5 years on the market, but all severe and one death. Yikes. Be cautious. – Michelle Fay Cortez (@FayCortez) August 29, 2018

STDs Hit Record Highs As Antibiotic Resistant Gonorrhea Concern Emerges- CDC The US saw record numbers of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in 2017 – as nearly 2.3 million cases of gonorrhea, chlamidya and syphilis were reported, marking the fourth straight year of sharp increases, according to preliminary data from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). What’s more – the CDC is now warning that antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea is now spreading, while prevention efforts have stagnated as people use condoms less frequently. Via the CDC:

• Gonorrhea diagnoses increased 67 percent overall (from 333,004 to 555,608 cases according to preliminary 2017 data) and nearly doubled among men (from 169,130 to 322,169). Increases in diagnoses among women – and the speed with which they are increasing – are also concerning, with cases going up for the third year in a row (from 197,499 to 232,587).
• Primary and secondary syphilis diagnoses increased 76 percent (from 17,375 to 30,644 cases). Gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men (MSM) made up almost 70 percent of primary and secondary syphilis cases where the gender of the sex partner is known in 2017. Primary and secondary syphilis are the most infectious stages of the disease.
• Chlamydia remained the most common condition reported to CDC. More than 1.7 million cases were diagnosed in 2017, with 45 percent among 15- to 24-year-old females.

3 STDs are more common than ever before in the US – and a ‘super gonorrhea’ is coming in hot – There were 2.3 million cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis diagnosed in the US last year, according to preliminary data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It marks a record high for the country and the fourth year in a row of “steep, sustained increases” in these three infections, according to a CDC press release.The data was presented at the National STD Prevention Conferencein Washington on Tuesday, CNN reported.From 2013 to 2017, gonorrhea diagnoses increased by 67% and nearly doubled in men, syphilis diagnoses increased by 76%, and chlamydia remained the most common condition reported to the CDC.

Ebola Deaths In DRC Spike 21% In Four Days, Bordering Countries On High Alert –The latest Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DNC) has claimed 67 lives, up from 55, according to Robert Redfield, director of the CDC. On Friday the WHO said that the virus has spread to an area of “high security risk,” and that ongoing local conflicts have made finding and monitoring infected people extremely difficult. “Really, in two weeks, we’ve gone from 24 cases to 105 cases,” said Redfield, who just returned from the hot zone where an outbreak centered in North Kivu is responsible for 105 confirmed or suspected cases, according to the Washington Post. There are currently 77 confirmed cases, 28 probable cases in which biological samples are not available for laboratory testing, while 3,000 people have received an experimental Ebola vaccine. Update on #Ebola in #DRC for 24 August, with data up to 23 August: Total of 105 cases (77 confirmed & 28 probable), including 67 deaths. In addition, 10 suspect cases are under investigation https://t.co/aC1yUqAb6Z – Peter Salama (@PeteSalama) August 25, 2018

Coffee Does Not Merit Cancer Warning Label Ordered In California, FDA Says – The Food and Drug Administration has stepped into a simmering debate in California as to whether coffee should come with a cancer warning label. In March, a judge sided with a nonprofit organization called the Council for Education and Research on Toxics that argued that coffee contains high levels of acrylamide, a cancer-causing chemical compound produced as beans roast. Coffee companies didn’t deny acrylamide’s presence but argued that it was found at low levels that posed no significant health risk and was outweighed by other health benefits. That argument wasn’t compelling to Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Elihu Berle. He ordered coffee companies in California to carry a cancer warning label under Proposition 65, the state’s Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act. The law, which requires the state to maintain a list of harmful substances and businesses to notify customers of exposure, has led to both a reduction in carcinogenic chemicals and quick settlements over labels on foods. On Wednesday, FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said in a statement that “if a state law purports to require food labeling to include a false or misleading statement, the FDA may decide to step in.”He added that a large body of research has found little evidence that coffee causes cancer and instead suggested that it might reduce the risk of some cancers.

‘Should I Throw Out My Cheerios?’ and Other Questions About Roundup in Children’s Food –Recently, Environmental Working Group (EWG) released a headline-making report on Roundup in children’s cereal and other oat-based foods. Much of the news coverage agrees with us that parents should be concerned. It’s first important to understand how a chemical like glyphosate, the main ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup, gets into our food supply. You’ve probably heard of Roundup, a weed killer sprayed on genetically engineered corn and soybeans. But Roundup is also used as a desiccant – a drying agent sprayed just before harvest on oats and other grains to make harvesting cheaper and easier. This use of Roundup is what caused the high levels of glyphosate in the oat-based foods we tested. Based on our research and other studies, glyphosate is likely present in foods other than oats. The Food and Drug Administration has been testing foods for glyphosate since 2015, but has not made its data public. Quaker Oats, General Mills and other companies would have you believe that because the amounts of glyphosate EWG found in their products are within the limits allowed by the Environmental Protection Agency, there’s nothing for parents to worry about. But just because something is legal, doesn’t mean it’s safe.

Fight Against Glyphosate Could Reignite Push for Agent Orange Justice –A jury’s verdict in California that a groundskeeper got cancer from repeated exposure to Monsanto‘s Roundup weedkiller is offering new hope for justice for millions of plaintiffs an ocean away. During the Vietnam War, Monsanto was one of the primary companies that supplied Agent Orange to the U.S military, which sprayed 44 million liters (approximately 11.5 million gallons) of the dioxin-containing herbicide on the jungles of South Vietnam. As a result, at least three million Vietnamese people have suffered from cancer, neurological damage and reproductive problems that have been passed down three or four generations, Viet Nam News reported. “The verdict serves as a legal precedent which refutes previous claims that the herbicides made by Monsanto and other chemical corporations in the U.S. and provided for the U.S. army in the war are harmless,” spokesman for Vietnam foreign ministry spokesperson Nguyen Phuong Tra said, as The Independent reported Sunday.

Bees become ‘addicted’ to harmful pesticides, scientists warn — Bees become addicted to pesticides in the same way that humans grow dependent on cigarettes, new research has found.The more of the nicotine-like chemicals they consume, the more they appear to want, a study has shown.The findings suggest that the risk of potentially harmful pesticide-contaminated nectar entering bee colonies is higher than was previously thought.Controversial neonicotinoid pesticides are chemically similar to nicotine, the addictive compound in tobacco.In 2013 the European Union imposed a partial ban on three widely used neonicotinoids because of evidence that they may be harmful to bees.The ban has now been extended to cover all crops not grown in greenhouses, despite strong opposition from some groups including the UK’s National Farmers’ Union, but it could be revoked following Brexit.In a series of studies, a team of British researchers offered bumblebees a choice of two sugar solutions, one of which was laced with neonicotinoid pesticides. They found that over time the bees increasingly preferred feeders containing the pesticide-flavoured sugar.

Rise in Insect Pests Under Climate Change to Hit Crop Yields, Study Says – Global warming could increase both the number and appetite of insect pests, new research finds, which could pose a serious threat to global crop production.The study finds that global warming of 2C above pre-industrial levels – which is the limit set by the Paris agreement – could cause pest-related yield losses from wheat, rice and maize to increase by 46 percent, 19 percent and 31 percent, respectively. And each additional degree of temperature rise could cause yield losses from insect pests to increase by a further 10-25 percent, the research shows. Losses from pest infestation are likely to be largest in China, the U.S. and France – three of the world’s most important grain producers, according to the findings.

If the world ate the USDA-recommended diet, there wouldn’t be enough land to grow it – CBC –If everyone in the world followed the USDA-recommended diet, there wouldn’t be enough agricultural land to grow all the food, a new study has found.The researchers from the University of Guelph and the University of Waterloo, both in Ontario, said an additional gigahectare of fertile land – roughly the size of Canada – would be required to feed everyone, highlighting the fact that dietary guidelines should be based on more than just nutrition.The study, funded by a Canadian government grant through the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, sought to address the issue of sustainability in the global diet.

Missouri Becomes First State to Regulate the Word ‘Meat’ – Missouri is the first state in the country to enact a law that criminalizes certain uses of the word “meat.”The mandate, which came into effect on Tuesday, prohibits companies from “misrepresenting” products as meat if they are not from “harvested livestock or poultry.” The measure was approved by the legislature in May and signed by former-Gov. Eric Greitens on June 1. Violators could be fined $1,000 and face imprisonment for a year, according to USA TODAY.The initiative was backed by the state’s pork producers, the Missouri Farm Bureau and the Missouri Cattlemen’s Association.”The big issue was marketing with integrity and … consumers knowing what they’re getting,” Missouri Cattlemen’s Association spokesman Mike Deering told USA TODAY.

Animal Activists Face Felony Charges for Rescuing Dying Birds — I’m one of six activists currently facing up to 10 years in federal prison. Our crime? We walked onto a factory farm and carried out a pair of dying turkeys from among thousands languishing in a filthy shed. We then rushed them to a vet for life-saving medical care.The farm I visited is owned by Norbest, a company that sells turkeys in rural Utah. Its marketing showcases a gorgeous alpine vista and sprawling meadows with “mountain-grown” turkeys.But the reality we found was a nightmare. The birds were crammed into filthy industrial sheds by the thousands. I saw gaping head wounds, turkeys struggling to stand in their own feces and dying birds amongst the living.During another visit, on a particularly frigid night, the team spotted a lump in the middle of the road. This something revealed herself to be someone – a young turkey later named Grace. She had likely fallen from a transport truck and, against all odds, had survived her injuries.Grace was wrapped in a blanket and received personal care before a vet appointment the following morning. She would occasionally make eye contact, accompanied by a gentle chirp. Unfortunately, the vet explained, both of her fragile legs were broken and she had extensive internal injuries. The kindest thing we could do was to let her go.

First Yellowstone-area grizzly hunt in 40 years blocked by federal judge (Reuters) – A federal judge in Montana on Thursday issued a court order temporarily blocking the first trophy hunts of Yellowstone-area grizzly bears in more than 40 years, siding with native American groups and environmentalists seeking to restore the animals’ protected status. The 14-day restraining order by U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen in Missoula, Montana, came two days before Wyoming and Idaho were scheduled to open licensed grizzly hunts allowing as many as 23 bears in the two states to be shot and killed for sport. Groups opposing the hunts had sought a restraining order while waiting for the judge to rule on the larger question of whether the federal government should return Endangered Species Act safeguards to grizzlies in the greater Yellowstone region.

Sweden’s reindeer at risk of starvation after summer drought — Sweden’s indigenous Sami reindeer herders are demanding state aid to help them cope with the impact of this summer’s unprecedented drought and wildfires, saying their future is at risk as global warming changes the environment in the far north.The Swedish government this week announced five major investigations aimed at preparing the country for the kind of extreme heatwave it experienced in July, when temperatures exceeded 30C (86F) and forest fires raged inside the Arctic circle.But it has yet to come up with any concrete measures for the country’s 4,600 Sami reindeer owners – the only people authorised to herd reindeer in Sweden – and their 250,000 semi-domesticated animals, raised for their meat, pelts and antlers.The owners are asking for emergency funding to help pay for supplementary fodder as a replacement for winter grazing lands that could take up to 30 years to recover from the summer’s drought and fires.

What do you do when the well runs dry? — We don’t know how lucky we are, what we have and what we could lose if we’re not careful. It becomes evident after driving the High Plains from Omaha to Dodge City, and then down through the Panhandle enroute to the place where we bought the Southwest from the Mexicans at the end of a gun barrel. The borderlands. Things get tougher south of the Nebraska border, south of Lindsborg, Kan., hometown of Storm Laker Carol Peterson. The corn looks punky but they grow it, some dryland counties yielding 48 bushels per acre, some 90. Where they irrigate, increasingly as you drive southwest, they run 140- to 200-bushel corn. And in those spots where the yields rival Iowa’s, the Ogallala Aquifer serving eight states of the Great Plains has dropped by 150 feet since 1950. It is some 300 feet deep by my reading in most places.

By 2050, nearly 300 mln people could lack enough zinc or protein and 1.4 bln women and children will be vulnerable to iron deficiency (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Rising carbon emissions could make vital food crops from wheat to rice less nutritious and endanger the health of hundreds of millions of the world’s poorest, scientists said on Monday. Certain staple crops grown in open fields with elevated carbon dioxide levels had up to 17 percent lower levels of protein, iron and zinc compared to those grown amid less of the gas, according to a study in the journal Nature Climate Change. Global emissions of carbon dioxide, largely from fossil-fuel use, are at record highs and the primary cause of global average temperature rise, which countries are seeking to curb to avoid the most devastating effects. Nearly 200 countries reached an agreement two years ago in Paris to curb emissions. The research found that by 2050, nearly 300 million people could lack enough zinc or protein and 1.4 billion women and children will be vulnerable to iron deficiency – all linked to carbon emissions – fuelling the risk of disease and early death.

Study shows air pollution may be causing cognitive decline in people – A trio of researchers from Beijing Normal University, Yale University and Peking University has found a link between air pollution and human cognitive decline. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Xin Zhang, Xi Chen, and Xiaobo Zhang outline their study and what they found. Most everyone knows that air pollution can cause physical ailments, particularly those associated with the lungs, but new evidence suggests it can also cause mental harm. In this new effort, the researchers have built on the findings of other studies that have suggested air pollution can cause cognitive decline.The study by the trio consisted of carrying out math and verbal testing of 25,000 people living in 162 counties in China and then comparing those results with air pollution conditions.

Air Pollution Shortens Human Life by One Year, on Average – In a summer marked by air quality alerts as wildfires rage in the western U.S., a study has been published finding that air pollution lowers the average lifespan by one year worldwide. The study, published in Environmental Science and Technology Letters Aug. 22, was the first to assess the impact of particulate matter pollution smaller than 2.5 micrometers (PM2.5) on human life expectancy on a per country basis, ScienceNews reported. The researchers used 2016 data from the Global Burden of Disease project in an attempt to make the health impacts of air pollution more concrete.

EU tackles cancer risk in football pitches – How much should society spend to save a life? That’s the issue facing EU and national regulators as they try to decide whether to lower the permitted concentrations of possibly cancer-causing chemicals allowed in the rubber pellets on artificial football fields. The cost would be high – ranging from €40 million to €3.1 billion – for the necessary industry changes that could prevent an estimated two to 12 cancer cases over a decade. But the issue is about more than euros for Nigel Maguire, whose son Lewis died in March just after his 20th birthday. Maguire, a former executive in the U.K.’s National Health Service, thinks the chemicals in the artificial football fields his son played on as a goalie had something to do with the cancer that killed him. Rubber pellets used in artificial football pitches are often made from scrapped tires, which contain low concentrations of a plethora of hazardous and cancer-causing chemicals. Goalkeepers like Lewis are thought to be the most vulnerable from any potential harm, as they often dive and can accidentally ingest the little black pellets.Scientific committees in the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) are debating a proposal presented last week by the Netherlands to lower the allowed limits for these chemicals.

As classes begin, Detroit schools shut off drinking water due to high levels of lead and copper – The Detroit Public School system has shut off drinking water at every one of the 106 school buildings it operates because of elevated levels of lead and copper found in water testing at 16 out of 24 schools. The announcement is an admission that the catastrophic conditions in Flint, Michigan, caused by the profit-driven decision to shift the city’s water system to polluted water from the Flint River, are replicated for school children in Detroit, the largest city in Michigan and the poorest big city in America. The notice to teachers and parents about the decision to cut off water avoids the obvious implication: for years, hundreds of thousands of school children and thousands of teachers have been exposed to poisoning by lead, copper and other toxins, with incalculable consequences on their long-term health. A spokeswoman for the school district told the Detroit Free Press that there was “no evidence at all that children have been impacted from a health standpoint,” but the district has said that it will not be carrying out any tests on the students to check for high lead levels. Officials of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department and the Great Lakes Water Authority said there was no excess lead or copper in the water being delivered to school buildings, indicating that the source of the pollution was internal to the buildings themselves, the result of decades of inadequate investment in their plumbing infrastructure.Superintendent Nikolai Vitti sent a robocall to parents on Sunday, August 26, alerting them to the lead-tainted and copper-tainted water coming into DPS water fountains and kitchens where school lunches are prepared. On Monday, as teachers entered schools to prepare for the new year, they were alerted that lead had been found in some schools and not others. Those schools found to have lead would have water coolers and water bottles available. On Tuesday, teachers received a note from the superintendent informing them of test results showing excess lead or copper levels in water at 16 of the 24 schools tested. Coupled with earlier tests from 2016 and the spring of 2018, this brought to 34 the number of schools where drinking water has been turned off.

Kansas Didn’t Tell Residents Their Water Was Contaminated For Years – The Kansas government allowed hundreds of residents in two Wichita-area neighborhoods to drink watercontaminated by a cleaning chemical called perchloroethylene, also known as PCE or tetrachloroethylene,The Wichita Eagle reported Sunday.The state discovered the tainted groundwater at a Haysville dry cleaner in 2011 but the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) did not act for more than six years. KDHE did not test nearby private wells or alert residents about the contamination.Similar contamination was discovered at another dry cleaning site near Central and Tyler in Wichita, but the state did not notify residents for four years.KDHE said they initially assumed the contaminated groundwater in Haysville was traveling southwest away from the private wells. They did not realize until 2017 that the groundwater was actually flowing southwest and directly along the wells.The delay in notification can be blamed on a 1995 state law requested by the dry cleaning industry called the Kansas Drycleaner Environmental Response Act that actually instructs health authorities not to look for contamination from shops. One family’s private well that was tested had water containing 49 parts per billion of PCE, about 10 times what the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency allows.

Red tide: Florida powerless to stem killer algae bloom– In Florida, the uncontrolled growth of an alga known as “red tide” has the state in emergency. The beaches of pristine waters now have a dark colour. The red tide has left tons of dead animals, has affected local businesses and has worried the inhabitants who do not know how long this phenomenon will last. The breeze brings a penetrating stench of rotten fish and the water, which is usually crystal blue, now has a copper brown colour. Dozens of dead fish float in the surf. “When the concentration of red tide is high it kills everything,” says Dr Rick Bartleson, research scientist at The Sanibel Captiva Conservation Foundation Marine Laboratory (SCCF).The “red tide” Mr Bartleson refers to is a toxic microscopic alga, Karenia brevis, which every year comes naturally to the Gulf of Mexico.”This red tide has been off the charts,” says Dr Bartleson, who has been studying the phenomenon for several years. It has lasted much longer and spread much more than usual. This season the toxic algae began in October 2017 and has since expanded by about 150 miles (240km) on Florida’s west coast. The situation is so serious that Rick Scott, Florida’s Governor, has declared a state of emergency due to impacts of the red tide in seven counties that include Collier, Lee, Charlotte, Sarasota, Manatee, Hillsborough and Pinellas. Since November 2017, the red tide has taken a toll on the marine life around this extremely diverse paradise. At least 29 manatees are confirmed to have died due to the toxin by the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC). Seventy-four more deaths are being investigated. The FWC has documented 588 stranded sea turtles and attributes 318 of them to the red tide. But the red tide can also affect people. According to the National Oceanic Service, sea waves can cause K. brevis cells to release toxins into the air, causing skin irritations and respiratory problems. For people with chronic conditions such as asthma, the red tide can make them very sick.

Is a super bloom on the way? Scientists worry a ‘brown tide’ will merge with red tide – The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is reporting an outbreak of Trichodesmium, sometimes called a brown tide, in waters offshore of Manatee County. It is a separate species but similar to the well documented Karenia brevis, a photosynthetic organism responsible for the persistent red tide hitting Manatee and other nearby counties along 130 miles of coastline. Concerns are now being raised that if the two blooms merge, it could essentially deepen an ongoing red tide. Kathleen Rein, a chemist at Florida International University, said a Trichodesmium bloom in the midst of the ongoing red tide crisis could be “very bad news.” While unable to address the size, location or movement as of Thursday, Rein said, “I can tell you that Trichodesmium is a cyanobacteria. It is photosynthetic, like Karenia. Its growth is believed to be simulated by iron in Saharan dust. It fixes nitrogen, then the fixed nitrogen can be used by Karenia brevis to help it grow. Let’s hope the two blooms don’t find each other.” So far, FWC is only reporting that the brown tide is being detected in offshore waters, though it can appear anywhere this time of year. . Blooms can get so big that they can be seen from space and while some can produce toxins, they are typically not harmful to marine life on their own. Unless the brown tide merges with red tide and essentially becomes a red tide’s food source. Mote Marine scientist Vincent Lovko said Trichodesmium is unique in that it forms well offshore and instead of getting nutrients from the water, pulls nitrogen from the air. While some strains can be toxic, Lovko said there has never been a reported toxic brown bloom in the Gulf of Mexico. Lovko said Trichodesmium is more present on the surface than K brevis, which lingers about a meter under the water. The problem is when the surface bloom starts to die and sinks into the red tide, it can provide a food source to the red tide, potentially extending its natural lifespan.

Surprise Python Hybrid Could Pose Greater Threat to Everglades Wildlife – Burmese pythons have long posed a threat to the indigenous wildlife in Everglades National Park since pet owners abandoned a few of them there in the 1980s, The Guardian reported.They have displaced American alligators as the Everglades’ top predators and have been found responsible for putting a dent in the populations of raccoons, opossums and bobcats, according to The National Parks Traveler.Now, an Aug. 19 study from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has revealed a surprise finding about the pythons that could make them an even bigger threat to biodiversity in the famous national park and across South Florida: some had DNA from the Indian python, which is a smaller, faster species that prefers dry ground to swamps, according to The Guardian.Researchers are now concerned the hybrid snakes could adapt even better to the South Florida environment and expand their range.”When two species come together they each have a unique set of genetic traits and characteristics they use to increase their survival and their unique habitats and environments,” lead study author and USGS geneticist Margaret Hunter told The Guardian. “You bring these different traits together and sometimes the best of those traits will be selected in the offspring. That allows for the best of both worlds in the Everglades, it helps them to adapt to this new ecosystem potentially more rapidly.”One concern is that hybrid snakes might slither out of the swamp and hunt prey on dry land, since Burmese pythons prefer the water and Indian pythons prefer higher ground. “If the Indian pythons have a wider range, perhaps these Everglades snakes now have that capability,” Hunter told the Miami Herald. “It’s quite interesting and quite surprising, but we don’t know the extent it’s in the population.”

Great Barrier Reef headed for ‘massive death’ — John “Charlie” Veron — widely known as “The Godfather of Coral” — is a renowned reef expert who has personally discovered nearly a quarter of the world’s coral species and has spent the past 45 years diving Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. But after a lifetime trying to make sense of the vast ecosystems that lie beneath the ocean’s surface, the 73-year-old is now becoming a prophet of their extinction. “It’s the beginning of a planetary catastrophe,” he tells CNN. “I was too slow to become vocal about it.” In 2016 and 2017, marine heat waves caused by climate changeresulted in mass bleaching, which killed about half of the corals on the Great Barrier Reef, along with many others around the world. “Somewhere between a quarter and a third of all marine species everywhere has some part of their life cycle in coral reefs,” he says. “So, you take out coral reefs and a third to a quarter of all marine species gets wiped out. Now that is ecological chaos, it is ecological collapse.” One of the natural wonders of the world, the Great Barrier Reef is 2,300km long — roughly the length of Italy — and is the only living organism that can be seen from space. When Veron, a former Chief Scientist at the Australian Institute of Marine Science, first went diving on the vast reef in the early 1960s he felt like “his life started.” “It was so much packed into a small area, so much life, so much activity, even noisy. It was really a metropolis, it was really humming and buzzing,” he says. At that stage, he had no idea about what was in store for this vibrant underwater habitat. “I was a climate change skeptic, at first,” he says. He realized that climate change was “serious” in the mid-1980s, and around 1990 he became “alarmed” about its impact on coral reefs. Veron says the mass bleaching events in the past few years — and the prospect of losing one of nature’s greatest treasures — were a wake-up call for the world in the wider battle against climate change.

Scientists find corals in deeper waters under stress too — Coral reefs around the world are threatened by warming ocean temperatures, a major driver of coral bleaching. Scientists routinely use sea-surface temperature data collected by satellites to predict the temperature-driven stress on reef communities, but new research shows that surface measurements alone may not accurately predict the full extent of thermal stress on deeper corals. A new study led by scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego and the Coral Reef Research Foundation (CRRF) in Palau describes a novel approach for predicting warm temperature-induced stress on corals from the sea surface through a deeper expanse ranging from 30-150 meters (100-500 feet) known as the mesophotic zone.Corals at this depth are thought of by some in the science community as being safer from ocean warming than their shallow-water counterparts. But the Scripps Oceanography team found that even in the deep, corals are episodically exposed to thermal stress at intervals different than those corals near the surface.The researchers utilized nearly two decades of data sets – including sea level, sea-surface temperature, and temperature observations that ranged between the surface and deep into the mesophotic zone – to develop a forecast tool for the vertical extent of how corals will be stressed by temperature. This research was conducted at three reef locations around the island nation of Palau, located in the tropical Pacific Ocean. This novel approach to measure and predict temperature stress on coral reefs is described in a new study published Aug. 27 in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

300 Endangered Sea Turtles Killed in Illegal Fishing Net Off Mexico’s Pacific Coast — Fishermen found roughly 300 dead sea turtles off the southern Pacific coast of Mexico on Tuesday.The olive ridley turtles, which Mexico classifies as being at risk of extinction, were entangled in an abandoned illegal fishing net, Reutersreported.Olive ridleys, named for their greenish skin and shell, descend on a number of Mexican states along the Pacific coast between May and September to lay eggs.Mexico’s office of the federal attorney for environmental protection (PROFEPA) said the turtles were found in a 393-foot long net that is not approved for fishing, according to the Associated Press.They were dead for about eight days and badly decomposed when they were found in the water near Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, PROFEPA said. Earlier this year, World Animal Protection released a report highlighting that 640,000 metric tons of fishing nets are lost or discarded in our oceans each year, trapping and killing countless marine mammals, including endangered whales, seals and turtles. Shallow coral reef habitats also suffer further degradation from the gear, which can take up to 600 years to decompose. The grisly discovery comes just days after 113 endangered turtles were found dead in the southern state of Chiapas. The turtles were found dead between July 24 and Aug. 13 in different parts of the Puerto Arista sanctuary. The cause is still being investigated, but experts said the animals could have died from asphyxiation, fish hooks or harmful algae, PROFEPA told Reuters.

Plastic straw ban? Cigarette butts are the single greatest source of ocean trash -Environmentalists have taken aim at the targets systematically, seeking to eliminate or rein in big sources of ocean pollution – first plastic bags, then eating utensils and, most recently, drinking straws. More than a dozen coastal cities prohibited plastic straws this year. Many more are pondering bans, along with the states of California and Hawaii. Yet the No. 1 man-made contaminant in the world’s oceans is the small but ubiquitous cigarette butt – and it has mostly avoided regulation. A leading tobacco industry academic, a California lawmaker and a worldwide surfing organization are among those arguing cigarette filters should be banned. “It’s pretty clear there is no health benefit from filters. They are just a marketing tool. And they make it easier for people to smoke,” . “It’s also a major contaminant, with all that plastic waste. It seems like a no-brainer to me that we can’t continue to allow this.” A California assemblyman proposed a ban on cigarettes with filters, but couldn’t get the proposal out of committee. A New York state senator has written legislation to create a rebate for butts returned to redemption centers, though that idea also stalled. San Francisco has made the biggest inroad – a 60-cent per pack fee to raise roughly $3 million a year to help defray the cost of cleaning up discarded cigarette filters. Cigarette butts have now also fallen into the sights of one of the nation’s biggest anti-smoking organizations, the Truth initiative. . As in a couple of previous ads delivered via social media, the organization is going after “the most littered item in the world.” It’s no wonder that cigarette butts have drawn attention. The vast majority of the 5.6 trillion cigarettes manufactured worldwide each year come with filters made of cellulose acetate, a form of plastic that can take a decade or more to decompose. As many as two-thirds of those filters are dumped irresponsibly each year, according to Novotny, who founded the Cigarette Butt Pollution Project. The Ocean Conservancy has sponsored a beach cleanup every year since 1986. For 32 consecutive years, cigarette butts have been the single most collected item on the world’s beaches, with a total of more than 60 million collected over that time. That amounts to about one-third of all collected items and more than plastic wrappers, containers, bottle caps, eating utensils and bottles, combined.

UK doubles down on plastic bag charges as it plans to expand and increase levy – The U.K. government is set to extend its 5 pence (7 cent) plastic bag charge to all retailers, subject to consultation. The charge, which was introduced in 2015, currently applies to big businesses only.The government said Thursday that it would also consult on increasing the minimum charge to at least 10 pence.The introduction of the 5 pence charge has proved effective. Plastic bag sales in major supermarkets have fallen by 86 percent since it was introduced, according to the government.”We are committed to being a global leader in tackling plastic pollution. It blights our seas and land and chokes our wildlife,” Environment Secretary Michael Gove said in a statement.”Thanks to the public’s support, our plastic bag charge has been hugely successful,” Gove added. “It has taken 13 billion plastic bags out of circulation in the last two years alone.”The issue of plastic pollution is a serious one. Europeans produce 25 million tons of plastic waste per year, according to the European Commission. Less than 30 percent of this is collected for recycling. The U.K. government has recently taken steps to mitigate the impact of plastic on the environment. In January, for example, a ban on the manufacture of products containing “microbeads” came into force.

Global warming is intensifying El Niño weather – As humans put more and more heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere, the Earth warms. And the warming is causing changes that might surprise us. Not only is the warming causing long-term trends in heat, sea level rise, ice loss, etc.; it’s also making our weather more variable. It’s making otherwise natural cycles of weather more powerful. Perhaps the most important natural fluctuation in the Earth’s climate is the El Niño process. El Niño refers to a short-term period of warm ocean surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific, basically stretching from South America towards Australia. When an El Niño happens, that region is warmer than usual. If the counterpart La Niña occurs, the region is colder than usual. Often times, neither an El Niño or La Niña is present and the waters are a normal temperature. This would be called a “neutral” state.The ocean waters switch back and forth between El Niño and La Niña every few years. Not regularly, like a pendulum, but there is a pattern of oscillation. And regardless of which part of the cycle we are in (El Niño or La Niña), there are consequences for weather around the world. For instance, during an El Niño, we typically see cooler and wetter weather in the southern United States while it is hotter and drier in South America and Australia.It’s really important to be able to predict El Niño/La Niña cycles in advance. It’s also important to be able to understand how these cycles will change in a warming planet. Fortunately, a study just published in Geophysical Research Letters helps answer that question. The authors include Dr. John Fasullo from the National Center for Atmospheric Research and his colleagues. El Niño cycles have been known for a long time. Their influence around the world has also been known for almost 100 years. It was in the 1920s that the impact of El Niño on places as far away as the Indian Ocean were identified. Having observed the effects of El Niño for a century, scientists had the perspective to understand something might be changing.

Hawaii Devastated by Flooding as Lane Rainfall Nears U.S. Record — Although Hawaii avoided a direct hit by Hurricane Lane, which weakened to a tropical storm over the weekend, areas of the Big Island were inundated with waist-deep water and flash flooding. Mountain View, located on the east side of the island, received a preliminary total of 51.53 inches of rain from Aug. 22-26 – the third highest storm total rainfall from a tropical cyclone in the U.S. since 1950, according to the National Weather Service. The highest total is the 60.58 inches of rain dumped on Nederland, Texas during Hurricane Harvey last year. The second highest – and the highest tropical cyclone storm total rainfall in Hawaii – is the 52.00 inches measured at Kanalohuluhulu Ranger Station during Hurricane Hiki in 1950. Authorities rescued 39 people from floodwaters on Friday and Saturday, the Associated Press reported. No storm-related deaths have been reported. The heavy downpour triggered landslides, caused a road to collapse in Haiku and rendered the neighborhood inaccessible, and even opened up sinkholes. Lane also dropped 36.76 inches of rain on Hilo Airport, the wettest four-day period ever observed at Hilo, with records dating back to 1949. Hilo also saw 15.00 inches of rain on Aug. 24, the fifth wettest calendar day on record.

Hawaii Takes A New Spot In U.S. Rainfall Records, After Hurricane Lane Drenches State — Hurricane Lane drenched parts of Hawaii with 3-4 feet of rainfall, with one weather station tallying the third-highest “total rainfall from a tropical cyclone in the United States since 1950,” the National Weather Service says. The slow-moving storm caused floods and landslides as it moved west of the islands, back out over the Pacific Ocean. Lane diminished as it neared Hawaii, but it still brought torrential rains as it lingered to the south and west of the islands. At one point over the weekend, the entire state was placed under a flash flood watch, Hawaii Public Radio reported. “Significant flash flooding” hit multiple areas across the northeast and east-facing slopes of the Big Island, according to the National Weather Service. The agency reported water rescues in Hilo and the town of Keaau. And complicating matters further, several highways were closed by either landslides or floodwaters. On the Big Island, the town of Mountain View recorded 51.53 inches of rain from Wednesday to Sunday. That’s the third-highest total ever measured from a U.S. storm, with the highest total being the 60.58 inches that fell on Nederland, Texas, over several days during Hurricane Harvey in 2017. The weather service says the second-highest total is the 52 inches recorded during Hurricane Hiki’s hit on Hawaii in 1950. Hilo International Airport got 36.76 inches of rain, making it “the wettest four-day period ever observed at Hilo, with records dating back to 1949,” the NWS says. On Sunday, surfers who wanted to take advantage of high waves were forced to navigate through trees, limbs and other debris that floodwaters and ocean currents had deposited on the beach. Farther inland, some residents used their bodyboards to paddle through flooded areas.

John Kerry trolls Infowars for claiming he used an ‘energy beam’ from Antarctica to control Hurricane Lane | TheHill: Former Secretary of State John Kerry trolled Alex Jones’ far-right conspiracy theory website Infowars on Friday after it accused Kerry of being responsible for Hurricane Lane. Infowars host Owen Shroyer was interviewing Darrell Hamamoto, a professor of Asian American studies at the University of California at Davis, Thursday about climate change as Hurricane Lane made its way across the Pacific Ocean toward Hawaii. Shroyer claimed an energy wave had been fired out of Antartica and split into two hurricanes that were heading for Hawaii.“Boom. An energy beam,” he said. “See if you guys can just pause it on that still frame so that – boom, right there. See if you guys can – right there. There’s the still frame right there. What is that coming out of Antarctica?” Hamamoto brought up that Kerry went to Antarctica after the presidential election, before Shroyer suggested the former secretary of State was somehow responsible for the hurricanes. “Yeah, why is John Kerry going down to Antarctica just a week after the election to discuss climate change and then you have energy beams coming out of Antarctica spilling hurricanes?” Shroyer asked. “What is John Kerry doing down there? That’s awfully suspicious to me.” Kerry shared the segment on Twitter, joking that he had been “busted.” The secret’s out – busted! https://t.co/hj2E94C7og – John Kerry (@JohnKerry) August 25, 2018

Hurricane Maria caused an estimated 2,975 deaths in Puerto Rico, new study finds – CBS – Hurricane Maria killed far more people in Puerto Rico than initially thought, accounting for an estimated 2,975 deaths on the island from September 2017 through February 2018, according to a new analysis. The study found that those in low-income areas, and elderly men, were at greatest risk of dying. The independent analysis was commissioned by the governor of Puerto Rico and conducted by researchers at George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health. CBS News obtained a report on the findings from Carlos Mercader, executive director of the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration.”The reality is that we take this very seriously,” Mercader said on CBSN. “We mourn those people that died because of this storm and we have a responsibility of making sure that we prepare Puerto Rico for a future event like this,” he said. To arrive at the 2,975 figure, the study looked at historical death patterns from 2010 to 2017 to estimate how many people would have died had Hurricane Maria not hit the island. That figure was then compared to the actual number of deaths from September 2017 through February 2018 – obtained in records provided by the Puerto Rico Vital Statistics Records division of the Puerto Rico Department of Health – to determine what the report describes as the “estimate of excess mortality due to the hurricane.”The study found that while all age groups and social strata were affected by the hurricane, the risk of death was “45% higher and persistent until the end of the study period for populations living in low socioeconomic development municipalities.”It also f ound that men age 65 and older were at heightened risk of death through February, the end of the study period.

63,000 Flee Deadly Myanmar Dam Collapse – A dam collapsed in Myanmar’s central Bago region Wednesday following heavy monsoon rains, displacing tens of thousands and killing at least four, as AFP reported that ministry officials confirmed Friday.”According to the information we got as of this morning, four people were killed and three went missing during the floods,” Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement director Phyu Lei Lei Tun said, according to AFP.The incident comes little over a month after a dam collapse in Laos killed more than 20 and raises further concerns about the safety of dams in Southeast Asia,Reuters pointed out. The breach occurred in the Swar Chaung dam’s spillway at 4 a.m. Wednesday and flooded Swar, Yadeshe and neighboring villages, CNN reported.Flooding affected at least 85 villages and displaced more than 63,000 people, Reuters reported.The breach also damaged a bridge on the highway linking the major cities of Yangon and Mandalay and the capital, Naypyitaw, disrupting traffic.Residents had expressed concerns about the level of water in the dam’s reservoir, but officials assured them it was safe just days before the collapse.Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation official Kaung Myat Thein said that there was no way to predict a spillway collapse, according to Reuters. “We could not know one day before, one hour before,” he said.

Beaver lifestyle impacts global warming – An institution in Finland has released evidence on the growing beaver population and its habitat and the impact on climate change. The University of Helsinki said the rising number of beaver dams has caused an increase in water levels in rivers and ponds, resulting in organic carbon from the soil being released into the atmosphere. Petri Nummi, a lecturer at the university, has been observing links between beavers’ lifestyle and global warming. “An increase in the number of beavers has an impact on the climate since a rising water level affects the interaction between beaver ponds, water and air, as well as the carbon balance of the zone of ground closest to water,” he said. There is an indication of beaver ponds becoming carbon sinks or sources of the gas and it is estimated that these ponds and meadows could potentially release up to 820,000 tons of carbon annually. Beaver families tend to change territories every three to five years, leaving the abandoned dam to gradually disintegrate. However, the dam may fill up again because of returnee beavers. These habitats undergo constant changes between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.

Dams and reservoirs can’t save us. This is the new future of water infrastructure. –In the recent past, humans thought of freshwater as a constant. Sometimes there was drought, and sometimes there was flood, but water levels always returned to normal eventually. So we built dams and reservoirs, hulking infrastructure they imagined as a bulwark against the pains of any short-term variation, on the assumption that the dry times would end and the basins would refill. But these gigantic objects are becoming dinosaurs in a new climactic age, characterized by growing human demand for freshwater and worsening, lengthening droughts. As Michael Hightower, a research professor of civil engineering at the University of New Mexico, puts it: “You don’t see people building new reservoirs, because they know there’s not going to be water to put in those reservoirs.”That means water engineers need to radically rethink the traditional approach to water infrastructure. They will need to get creative. In some cases, it may mean going back to basics and installing cisterns in backyards to harvest the rain. In others, it may mean doing as the astronauts have done since the advent of space travel: drinking one’s own recycled urine. That’s because water, especially in dry places, is finite. Rivers and streams and lakes usually originate as snowmelt or rainfall, and in dry parts of the world, those sources are in decline as droughts strike harder and more regularly. Meanwhile, human populations are growing, and using freshwater faster than it can be replenished. Potable water is a rare commodity and growing more precious by the decade.

Extreme heat is killing farm workers–the government doesn’t have a plan to protect them – In the Lake Apopka region of Florida, a typical August day might yield a high temperature of 92 degrees F, a heat made all the worse by the stifling humidity. The weather is bad enough for office workers who spend most of the day next to an air conditioner. For farm workers, who spend their August picking blueberries outdoors, the heat can be oppressive, even fatal.Heat can induce dehydration, nausea, exhaustion, stroke and death. Even among workers who endure little discomfort, heat can take a toll over time. Chronic dehydration, for example, can lead to kidney failure. Despite these risks, there is no federal standard protecting workers from extreme heat.“Hotter temperatures beget fewer full work days, exhaustion and fatigue,” said Jeannie Economos, the pesticide safety and environmental health project coordinator for the Farmworker Association of Florida. “It’s even worse when you have to pick fast because farm workers are paid by the piece, not the hour. This is a big deal when you’re trying to bring home wages that can support a family or pay a car bill – plus these folks don’t have health insurance.” Economos led a group of experts, advocates and reporters around a farm near Lake Apopka Sunday to explain the risks of extreme heat. “We’re finding more and more people that have dehydration. They have symptoms of heat stress, so they’re really concerned about that. Plus, workers are afraid to report their symptoms,” Economos said. “Their afraid to report to their supervisor or the crew leader or the labor contractor if they have symptoms of heat stress because they’re afraid they’ll be pulled off the job.” Undocumented migrant farm workers are especially vulnerable, as they are less likely to demand rest, shade or water for fear of retaliation.

Apocalyptic threat’: dire climate report raises fears for California’s future — California’s summer of deadly wildfires and dangerous heatwaves will soon be the new normal if nothing is done to stop climate change, a report released on Monday warns. City heatwaves could lead to two to three times as many deaths by 2050, the report says. By 2100, without a reduction in emissions, the state could see a 77% increase in the average area burned by wildfires. The report also warns of erosion of up to 67% of its famous coastline, up to an 8.8F (4.9C) rise in average maximum temperatures, and billions of dollars in damages. “These findings are profoundly serious and will continue to guide us as we confront the apocalyptic threat of irreversible climate change,” said the state’s governor, Jerry Brown, in a tweet about the report, the fourth statewide climate change assessment released since 2006.Rising temperatures could lead to up to 11,300 additional deaths in 2050, the report says, and the overall number of days marked by extreme heat will “increase exponentially in many areas”.The effects of those extreme heat days will probably weigh most heavily on the state’s most vulnerable residents, including the more than 100,000 people who are homeless in California, many of whom live on the streets without reliable access to fans, air conditioners, or running water. “The 2006 heatwave killed over 600 people, resulted in 16,000 emergency department visits, and led to nearly $5.4bn in damages,” the assessment reports. “The human cost of these events is already immense, but research suggests that mortality risk for those 65 or older could increase tenfold by the 2090s because of climate change.”

Mendocino Complex: Ranch Fire now 90 percent contained – Firefighters are nearing full containment on the Mendocino Complex Fire, the largest wildfire in California history, which has now been burning for more than a month. The Ranch Fire was 90 percent contained as of late Monday, a full month after the fire started, Cal Fire said in an incident update. The River Fire has been fully contained. Glenn County evacuations were lifted for residents Monday, leaving only Mendocino National Forest and Cow Mountain Recreational Areas closed to visitors, according to the incident report, which noted “good progress” on the Ranch Fire. The massive two-fire complex, which affected Mendocino, Lake, Colusa and Glenn counties, has dwarfed previous record holders. The Ranch Fire, the larger of the two blazes that comprised the Mendocino Complex Fire, had reached 410,182 acres as of Monday evening. Last year’s Thomas Fire in Southern California was previously the largest recorded blaze in state history. It reached 281,893 acres in December. The cause of the Mendocino Complex Fire, which started July 27, is still under investigation. The devastating blaze killed one firefighter and injured three others. It has also destroyed 280 structures, 157 of them residences, Cal Fire said. Responders continue to work on fully containing the Ranch Fire, with firefighters focusing on firing operations of interior areas and reinforcing containment lines in the northeastern flank of the fire, the Cal Fire update said. Crews continue to work on building containment lines in the northwestern portion of the fire area.

Feds embrace controlled burns as weapon against wildfires — The Forest Service plans to step up its use of prescribed fire – and it’s counting on the South to help promote the idea.Controlled fires are widely accepted in managing forests in parts of the South, and other parts of the country could learn from the experience there, the Forest Service said in a report outlining its wildfire strategy.”For cultural, historical, and biophysical reasons, the use of prescribed fire is widely accepted in large parts of the Southern United States,” the agency said in the report, which was released earlier this month. “The lessons learned by land managers and communities in the South might be useful in helping to overcome constraints elsewhere in the United States.”Southern forest managers said their regional tradition of using fire to clear forests of potential fuel for wildfires has made the population there more willing to accept trade-offs such as smoke and to entertain the idea that fires set on purpose can be contained – a key to adopting the technique more widely.”It can be done in a way that smoke is not a problem,” said Wib Owen, executive director of the Southern Group of State Foresters. “I think that it can be done even in populated areas.” The Forest Service report calls for more prescribed fire, as well as letting some naturally set wildfires burn under controlled conditions, along with forest-thinning and timber sales. The agency said it can treat 17 million acres of high-fire-risk forests through timber sales and more than twice as much – 35 million acres – through prescribed burns and other methods.

NASA map shows glowing particle clouds over Earth from wildfires and hurricanes – There’s something in the air: From sources such as wildfires, car emissions and, yes, even feces, tiny particles fly into our bodies with nearly every breath. That reminder comes courtesy of NASA, whose Earth Observatory offered a stunning map last week highlighting “the mishmash of particles that dance and swirl through the atmosphere.” Satellites and sensors from the agency picked up aerosols swirling densely in climates around the world on Aug. 23, from smoke billowing from California wildfires to sea salt flung high from raging cyclones in the Pacific Ocean.A model, called the Goddard Earth Observing System Forward Processing, uses data-driven equations to produce the visualization. Aerosols on the map, all coded by color, hint at major events unfolding on that August date.The raging wildfires that destroyed parts of California produced black carbon particles, which show up in a glowing red on the map. That red glow also appears over central Africa, too, this time from intentional fires started by farmers to maintain grazing and crop lands, the agency said. Sea salt aersols, which appear as blue, swirl near Hawaii as Hurricane Lane approached the state. Larger blue swirls hint at sea salt stirred up by twin typhoons Soulik and Cimaron, which neared South Korea and Japan at the time, the agency notes. Purple clouds, representing dust particles, suggest strong winds across the Sahara as well as China’s Taklamakan Desert and the Gulf of Oman. Some aerosols, such as smoke from a fire or volcanic ash, are visible to the naked eye. Particles can also stem “from construction sites, unpaved roads, fields, smokestacks or fires,” the Environmental Protection Agency noted.

World On Fire – The world is on fire. Or so it appears in this image from NASA’s Worldview. The red points overlaid on the image designate those areas that by using thermal bands detect actively burning fires. Africa seems to have the most concentrated fires. This could be due to the fact that these are most likely agricultural fires. The location, widespread nature, and number of fires suggest that these fires were deliberately set to manage land. Farmers often use fire to return nutrients to the soil and to clear the ground of unwanted plants. While fire helps enhance crops and grasses for pasture, the fires also produce smoke that degrades air quality.Elsewhere the fires, such as in North America are wildfires for the most part. In South America, specifically Chile has had horrendous numbers of wildfires this year. A study conducted by Montana State University found that: “Besides low humidity, high winds and extreme temperatures – some of the same factors contributing to fires raging across the United States – central Chile is experiencing a mega drought and large portions of its diverse native forests have been converted to more flammable tree plantations, the researchers said.” More on this study can be found here: https://phys.org/news/2018-08-massive-south-central-chile.html#jCpHowever, in Brazil the fires are both wildfires and man-made fires set to clear crop fields of detritus from the last growing season. Fires are also commonly used during Brazil’s dry period to deforest land and clear it for raising cattle or other agricultural or extraction purposes. The problem with these fires is that they grow out of control quickly due to climate issues. Hot, dry conditions coupled with wind drive fires far from their original intended burn area. According to the Global Fire Watch site (between 8/15 and 8/22) shows: 30,964 fire alerts.Australia is also where you tend to find large bushfires in its more remote areas. Hotter, drier summers in Australia will mean longer fire seasons – and urban sprawl into bushland is putting more people at risk for when those fires break out. For large areas in the north and west, bushfire season has been brought forward a whole two months to August – well into winter, which officially began 1 June. According to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (Bom), the January to July period 2018 was the warmest in NSW since 1910. As the climate continues to change and areas become hotter and drier, more and more extreme bushfires will break out across the entire Australian continent. NASA’sEarth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS)Worldview application provides the capability to interactively browse over 700 global, full-resolution satellite imagery layers and then download the underlying data. Many of the available imagery layers are updated within three hours of observation, essentially showing the entire Earth as it looks “right now. This satellite image was collected on August 22, 2018. Actively burning fires, detected by thermal bands, are shown as red points.

NOAA Issues Geomagnetic Storm Warning: “A Crack Opened In Earth’s Magnetic Field & Plasma Started Pouring In” — According to NOAA Space Weather forecasters, a powerful G3-class geomagnetic storm is in progress on August 26th as Earth passes through the wake of a coronal mass ejection (CME) that arrived with little notice approximately 24 hours ago. Strong magnetic fields in the CME’s wake have cracked into Earth’s magnetosphere, allowing solar wind to enter. So far auroras have been sighted in Scandinavia, Canada, and northern-tier US states such as Michigan and New York. “The geomagnetic field is expected to be at active to G3 (Strong) geomagnetic storm levels on day one (26 Aug) due to continued influence from the 20 Aug CME. Quiet to active conditions, with a slight chance for G1 (Minor) storm conditions, are likely on day two (27 Aug) with quiet to unsettled levels likely on day three (28 Aug) as CME effects gradually wane,” said the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, NOAA, Space Weather Prediction Center. Steven Herman, the White House bureau chief of Voice of America (VOA News), reported the strong geomagnetic storm on earlier Sunday morning. He shared a note listing the potential impacts of the storm, which included power systems, spacecraft, satellite communication networks, and even radio disruptions.A sunspot has formed as large as the Earth and now an active warning about a geomagnetic storm. https://t.co/AY9BIhLBJF pic.twitter.com/2CDuVmmJP5 – Steve Herman (@W7VOA) August 26, 2018 The K-index, a chart that measures the earth’s magnetic field with an integer in the range 0 – 9 with 1 being calm and 5 or more indicating a geomagnetic storm, hit the 4 threshold was reached at 21:43 UTC on August 25, followed by K-index of 5 (G1 Minor) at 01:54 UTC on August 26, K-index of 6 (G2 Moderate) at 02:57 and K-index of 7 (G3 Strong) at 05:59 and 07:38 UTC.

Climate change is melting the French Alps, say mountaineers – For the tourists thronging the streets and pavement cafes of Chamonix, the neck-craning view of Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in the Alps, is as dazzling as ever. But the mountaineers who climb among the snowy peaks know that it is far from business as usual – due to a warming climate, the familiar landscape is rapidly changing. “Global climate change has serious and directly observable consequences in high mountains,” says Vincent Neirinck from Mountain Wilderness, a campaign group that works to preserve mountain environments around the world. One of the consequences of climate change is the ongoing retreat of glaciers. “In the Alps, the glacier surfaces have shrunk by half between 1900 and 2012 with a strong acceleration of the melting processes since the 1980s,” says Jacques Mourey, a climber and scientist who is researching the impact of climate change on the mountains above Chamonix. The most dramatic demonstration of glacial retreat is shown by the Mer de Glace, the biggest glacier in France and one of Chamonix’s biggest tourist hotspots which would now be unrecognisable to the Edwardian tourists who first flocked there. “The Mer de Glace is now melting at the rate of around 40 metres a year and has lost 80m in depth over the last 20 years alone,” says glaciologist Luc Moreau. A stark consequence of the melting Mer de Glace is that 100m of ladders have now been bolted onto the newly exposed vertical rock walls for mountaineers to climb down onto the glacier.

Warm Waters Under Arctic Ice a ‘Ticking Time Bomb’ – Scientists warn that a warm layer of salty ocean water accumulating 50 meters beneath the Arctic‘s Canadian Basin could potentially melt the region’s sea-ice pack for much of the year if it reaches the surface.The findings were published Thursday in the journal Science Advances by researchers from Yale University and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.This “archived” heat is currently trapped under a surface layer of colder freshwater, but if the two layers mix, “there is enough heat to entirely melt the sea-ice pack that covers this region for most of the year,” lead authorMary-Louise Timmermans, a professor of geology and geophysics at Yale University, told YaleNews.The researchers discovered that the heat content of the warm, salty layer doubled from 200 to 400 million joules per square meter in the past 30 years.The warming layer is “a ticking time bomb,” the study’s co-author John Toole of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution told CBC.”That heat isn’t going to go away,” he added. “Eventually … it’s going have to come up to the surface and it’s going to impact the ice.”Scientists believe the warm water is coming from the Chukchi Sea in the south, where ice cover has beenrapidly melting and being exposed to the summer sun. Strong northerly winds are driving these warm waters north and flowing beneath the Canadian Basin.

Climate change means an Arctic shipping route has opened up for the first time – Enough sea ice has now melted that container ships can now use a shipping route through the Arctic. Ships carrying oil and gas have previously used the route with the help of ice breakers, but they may no longer be needed during the summer months.The first container ship to do the trip without an icebreaker will be the Venta Maersk – a 42,000 ton ice-class ship that can carry 3,600 containers. The route will cut journey times by two weeks and ships will no longer have to use the Suez canal. The Venta Maersk was set to leave Vladivostok, eastern Russia, through the Bering Strait between Russia and Alaska, then across the top of Russia before arriving in St Petersburg by the end of September.The northern route can be up to two weeks quicker than the more traditional routes, but the necessity for nuclear ice-breaker ships which accompany the vessels made it more costly. But the Arctic sea-ice hit a record low in January this year, and Data released by the National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Colorado showed ice cover was less than a third of what it was five years ago. Temperatures in the area have been soaring 30°C above average, meaning the ice levels have hit record lows.

US 2nd Fleet Reactivated, Preparing For Arctic Warfare With “Bad Actors” – Following a sharp increase in Russian naval activity in the arctic and North Atlantic, the Trump administration has reactivated Navy’s 2nd Fleet to deal with “bad actors on the world’s stage,” according to Vice Adm. Andrew “Woody” Lewis, who took command of the reestablished forces. In a Friday ceremony aboard the aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush, Lewis warned of foreign adversaries who intend to undermine American dominance, referring to (but not naming) Russia – which has vast military assets in the Arctic Circle, a region estimated to contain 15% of the world’s remaining oil and up to 30% of natural gas deposits. “There are some bad actors on the world’s stage,” Lewis told the crowd. “We call them competitors in our strategic documents. They intend to undermine and rewrite the order that America established at the end of world war II and threaten the very birthright freedoms that we hold sacred.” –Navy Times“Second Fleet has a storied history and we’ll honor that legacy,” Lewis told those in attendance. “However, we will not simply pick up where we left off. We are going to aggressively and quickly rebuild this command into an operational warfighting organization. We will challenge assumptions, recognize, our own vices and learn and adapt from our own failures in order to innovate and build a fleet that’s ready to fight.”The 2nd Fleet’s boundaries will extend “well past the old submarine stomping grounds of the Cold War into waters north of Scandinavia and the Arctic Circle,” near the submarine headquarters of Russia’s Northern Fleet, according to John Richardson, Chief of Naval Operations.

NASA Reveals Plan For Permanent Moon Base: “We Want Lots Of Humans In Space” – At a conference at the Johnson Space Center in Houston last week, Jim Bridenstine, a top official of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), told reporters that the agency wants “lots of humans in space,” according to Space.com. Bridenstine, who became the top official in April, had a meeting with Space.com and other journalists, during which he spilled the beans about a new program that plans to construct ‘Gateway’ modules to orbit the moon and close gaps in space exploration. Each gateway module would be a spacecraft that orbits the moon rather than a land-based settlement, which would be easier for astronauts to stay in low orbit and conduct brief surface missions lasting between one and two months.“When you look back at history, look back at the end of the Apollo program, 1972 when we didn’t go back to the moon… you look back and there was a period of time there after Apollo and before the space shuttles when we had a gap of human spaceflight capability,” Bridenstine said. “And then you go forward and look at the retirement of the space shuttles in 2011, and now we’re getting to the point where we’re ready to fly commercial crew. We’ve got a gap of about eight years in our ability to fly crew into space.“When we think about the [end of the] International Space Station, we want to make sure that a gap doesn’t materialize,” he said. “I believe it is important to do everything in our power to prevent another gap from occurring and that is why it is important to start this conversation now.”Bridenstine told reporters that NASA should had taken the opportunity to explore the moon almost a decade ago:“If you go back to 2009, the United States, through NASA, made a critical discovery, which is the moon has hundreds of billions of tons of water ice. To me, that should have changed our direction immediately,” he said. “From 1969, when we first landed on the moon, up until 2009, a lot of people believed that the moon was bone-dry. In 2008, the Indians did an experiment and they realized there was water ice on the moon and then we did an experiment and realized how much water ice could potentially be on the moon at the poles.”“So the question is – during those 40 years, we missed that. What else have we missed?”

India’s emissions will double at most by 2030 – In a global climate regime built around national climate pledges – known as “nationally determined contributions” (NDCs) – it becomes essential to understand the likelihood of meeting these pledges. However, understanding how national conditions will affect these pledges can be difficult, especially in rapidly changing developing countries, such as India. India is undertaking multiple transitions driven by demography, urbanisation and energy access, amid rapidly changing policies and technologies. All these factors will shape its emissions future, which has considerable importance to the future of global emissions.This means assessing how its emissions will be affected by national development goals, such as access to energy, becomes important for projecting future emissions. Our paper, recently published in Environmental Research Letters, explores these challenges.We interpret seven recent studies that project India’s emissions up to 2030 in the context of the country’s energy needs for development. (Therefore, the paper only explores CO2 emissions from energy – 68% of India’s total greenhouse gas emissions in 2012.)An important motivation for the study is the wide range of existing projections of India’s emissions, which defy clear discussion or policy interpretation.Our analysis begins by making explicit the implied policy assumptions underlying these scenarios. The figure below shows how studies with similar p olicy assumptions cluster together in terms of emissions and economic growth projections. This process illuminates the link between particular policy directions and their potential emissions impacts.

Global Carbon Sink Holding Up So Far– Stuart Staniford – NOAA makes available data on CO2 concentrations on Mauna Loa in Hawaii that go back to 1959. This is the famous Keeling curve, and the annual averages look like this: . This next graph compares the annual increase in carbon in the atmosphere to fossil fuel emissions of carbon (from BP): Since the amount of carbon in the atmosphere is increasing slower than carbon emissions, clearly some of the emissions are absorbed (by the ocean and by land plants) each year. The fraction of emissions absorbed is almost constant, but has increased slightly over time: But I think a more interesting way to look at the question is this. Think of the sink as reflecting the fact that the CO2 in the atmosphere is not in equilibrium with the CO2 in the ocean and terrestrial ecosystems. These latter components change slowly – the ocean is huge and takes around a thousand years to turn over, so changes in the atmosphere in the last few decades are far from fully equilibriated. Likewise, changes in terrestrial ecosystems have only just begun. From that perspective, we might expect the amount of carbon being absorbed by the ocean and biosphere to be proportional to how far the current atmospheric concentration is from pre-industrial concentrations (generally believed to be about 280ppm). If we plot this – the size of the annual carbon sink vs the departure from pre-industrial, we see that it is indeed linear: There are of course substantial year to year fluctuations depending on just how well global plants grew in any particular year (given weather). But if you try fitting a quadratic to that data (allowing for the possibility of the sink degrading over time), it lies exactly on the linear curve – there is no indication of a tailing off. This is somewhat reassuring with respect to the “Inevitable Near Term Human Extinction” (INTHE) view of climate change. One class of mechanisms that could lead to a runaway climate feedback would be if the biosphere were to start to turn from a net sink to a net source as a result of climate change – for example, forests burning, dying back from disease, the Amazon turning to savannah etc. While all of these things are happening to a modest degree, the fact that overall, the global climate sink continues to behave in a predictable linear way suggests that this particular class of runaway feedbacks are not biting hard yet.

Shell Oil Quietly Urges Lawmakers to Support Carbon Tax – Lobbyists for Shell Oil Co. told members of Congress this year that Shell supports a nationwide carbon tax and encouraged lawmakers to price greenhouse gas emissions, E&E News has learned.The company’s in-house lobbyists met with lawmakers in the Senate and the House, including Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.), who introduced a carbon tax bill last month. In a lobbying disclosure form dated last month, Shell said its representatives had taken part in “discussions in support of a robust, transparent federal carbon price” in the second quarter of the year.”We see carbon pricing as an essential policy tool to tackle climate change and pave the way for a smooth energy transition,” a Shell spokesman said in a statement.”Shell has long supported a strong and stable government-led carbon pricing framework,” the spokesman said. “It’s our view Government-led carbon pricing mechanisms are the lowest cost way to develop low carbon technologies for a low carbon economy.” A small but growing number of conservative advocacy groups and energy companies have talked openly about their support for a U.S. carbon tax, in particular in exchange for rolling back environmental regulations. The chance of passing carbon tax legislation is remote in the Republican-led Congress, but Shell is quietly laying the groundwork for similar bills in the future.Shell is not the only oil and gas major actively lobbying members of Congress for a carbon tax, industry sources said. Experts say the industry is not homogeneous in its approach to a carbon tax, with some majors taking more ambitious positions. The Climate Leadership Council, a group led by former secretaries of State James Baker and George Shultz, began promoting a $40-per-ton carbon tax plan in June 2017.

Carbon Markets Represent the Commodification of Earth – Forest carbon offsets neither protect forests nor reduce emissions. They allow continuation of business as usual. Under forest carbon offset schemes, forests are priced according to the carbon they contain, and credits can be earned by preserving those forests. Corporations can then buy those credits that are then used to further pollute rather than decrease their emissions.For example, at the notorious Chevron refinery in Richmond, California, “offset” emissions will continue to devastate surrounding communities, and the gross level of emissions remains the same.The tortured equations of forest carbon offsets also impact Indigenous and forest dependent communities globally, through forced relocations of entire societies so that governments can take over forests and sell the carbon stored as offsets. Beyond the social injustice of forest carbon offsets is the simple scientific fact that offsets literally mean a net result of standing in place. If today’s living species are to survive, this will not suffice; what is required are drastic reductions in emissions at the source.If we’re looking for a solution to climate change, then putting a price on carbon isn’t a serious strategy. It can’t address the roots of the problem, and isn’t designed to.However, if we’re driven less by concern over global warming than by incentives to try to help business muddle through a post-1970s profit crisis in an era of growing environmental regulation, then carbon pricing makes more sense. In other words, deciding what to think about carbon pricing means deciding who you are and what side you’re on.

Climate change action off the agenda under Morrison government – Australian Energy Minister Angus Taylor has unveiled a new energy policy focused exclusively on reducing electricity prices, in a strong signal the Morrison government will abandon all efforts to lower carbon emissions. The move comes a week after the issue of climate change precipitated the ousting of former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull. “My No.1 priority is very, very simple,” Mr Taylor said in a speech on Thursday. “It is to reduce power prices, and to do this while we keep the lights on.” He would do this, he said, by empowering consumers to shop around, cracking down on price gouging, and increasing “reliable supply” – a phrase that has come to refer to keeping coal-fired power stations running. “It’s ironic that in a country with an abundance of natural resources – coal, gas, water, solar, wind – we should be in the position we are today. We have to leverage those resources, not leave them in the ground.” Not a single policy to increase investment in renewables or lower emissions was announced.

Ontario cuts natural gas price after revoking cap-and-trade regulations -Premier Doug Ford says the Ontario government will remove the cost of the now-repealed cap-and-trade system from natural gas bills. Ford says the change means families will save $80 a year and small businesses will save $285 annually. He says the government has issued a directive to the Ontario Energy Board that will see the price of natural gas reduced by 3.3 cents per cubic metre starting on Oct. 1. The Tory government cancelled cap-and-trade last month and has launched a court challenge of Ottawa’s ability to impose a carbon tax on the province. The premier has said that cutting the carbon pricing system will help him lower gasoline prices for vehicles by 10 cents per litre.

California might bail out controversial desert pumped hydro plant -Eagle Crest Energy Company has been trying to build a hydroelectric power plant since the early 1990s. But the developer has struggled to find a buyer for the electricity, and environmentalists have fought the project, saying it would damage the national park. Now the California Legislature may step in to help the developer. Ten lawmakers have signed on to Assembly Bill 2787, which would require utilities to buy energy from “pumped storage” hydropower projects like Eagle Crest. The bill is opposed by the California Public Utilities Commission, which approved a resolution Thursday saying the legislation could force Californians to pay billions of dollars for an energy project they don’t yet need. The 1,300-megawatt, $2.5-billion Eagle Mountain project would be built on land surrounded by Joshua Tree National Park, about 70 miles east of Palm Springs.

Percent of Cropland Used for Biofuels in the U.S. – Big Picture Agriculture (see graphics) Ten percent of U.S. cropland acreage is devoted towards ethanol/biofuels production. This is some of the very best, richest soil in the world, requiring expensive corporate inputs backed by taxpayer subsidies, and, requiring water, including large amounts of fossil aquifer water. This amounts to 38.1 million acres, according to Bloomberg. Land use for ethanol and biodiesel includes well over one-third of the corn cropland, and about ten (or as high as 13) percent of soybean cropland. Twenty-two percent of this cropland is devoted to growing wheat, and other grain and feed to be exported. Presumably, that export total does not include the cropland used to grow and raise livestock and ethanol for export. (This year, again, ethanol exports are shattering previous year’s levels.) I assume Bloomberg places acres such as almond trees into the “food we eat” category, some of which also gets exported. Generally, but not always, the idle and fallow land is less arable. In summary, land use in the U.S. for cropland is one-fifth of the total, or 391.5 million acres, much of that across the Great Plains Midwest which was covered by prairie grasses up until one-hundred-fifty years ago.

Batteries, mine production, lithium and the “cobalt crunch” — Growth in Li-ion batteries depends on a number of imponderables, such as how rapidly the world converts to electric vehicles, how quickly battery manufacturing capacity can be ramped up and where the electricity to power millions of EVs will come from. This post ignores these issues, concentrating instead on the question of whether the mining sector can increase production of the metals and minerals needed to support a high-battery-growth scenario without running out of reserves. The data are not good enough to reach a firm conclusion, but the main uncertainty seems to be whether cobalt production from the Congo, which presently supplies over half of global demand, can be relied on. Lithium and cobalt reserves will not be exhausted in the time frame considered (out to 2030) but will be close to it if no additional reserves are discovered. Unless otherwise specified the data used in this post are from the following three sources:

• The 2018 BP Statistical Review of World Energy, which provides annual production and price data for lithium, cobalt, graphite and rare earths since 1995 but reserve data for 2017 only.
• The United States Geological Survey (USGS) annual Mineral Commodity Surveys, which provide annual production and reserve data for cobalt since 1990 but incomplete data for lithium (US production is excluded) and no price data.
• The British Geological Survey (BGS), which provides annual production data for all metals since 1970 but no data on reserves or prices.

Opinion is pretty much unanimous in projecting rapid growth in Li-ion batteries in coming years: The Apricum Group predicts a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22% through 2025: Global battery demand will increase fivefold from ~100 GWh today to ~500 GWh by 2025.Bloomberg predicts a CAGR of 29% in EVs through 2030, with Sales of electric vehicles (EVs) increasing from a record 1.1 million worldwide in 2017, to 11 million in 2025 and then surging to 30 million in 2030. Mining Weekly predicts 32% CAGR through 2025: The automotive industry’s use of lithium-ion batteries is on track to grow seven-fold to 650 GWh by 2025, from 70 GWh in 2017; the increase in energy storage, although from a lower base, will add to this. A number of other articles predict plus-15% CAGRs in Li-ion battery dollar sales volume between now and 2025, with examples here, here and here. These percentages will, however, understate demand growth for Li-ion metals and minerals because they assume decreasing battery costs.

Trump EPA to reconsider Obama-era mercury rule –EPA will reconsider a rule that restricts mercury and toxic air emissions from power plants, the agency confirmed to E&E News today.Agency spokeswoman Molly Block said it will initiate a federal review of a draft proposal to determine whether the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, or MATS, were “appropriate and necessary.” It also will evaluate the overall standards.”EPA knows these issues are of importance to the regulated community and the public at large and is committed to a thoughtful and transparent regulatory process in addressing them,” Block said in an email.Bloomberg BNA first reported the news.Most power plants have already complied with the regulation, which required the installation of pollution control technology. Others have shuttered. Several power companies now want the regulation to remain in place.”If EPA recklessly disrupts the legal obligations to meet the Mercury & Air Toxics Standards, across the country coal plant owners will face legal challenges to prior utility commission approvals of pollution control costs incurred to meet those obligations,” John Walke, director of the federal clean air, climate and clean energy program with the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in an email. “Worse, EPA could let coal plant owners turn off installed pollution control equipment whose costs are being charged to consumers. Americans will suffer, needlessly.” Conservatives, though, have argued reassessing – and potentially ditching – the rule is necessary. They noted the Supreme Court in 2015 said the Obama EPA needed to assess industry’s compliance costs in its analysis before determining whether the regulation was appropriate and necessary.

Surge in coal use scuttling climate change efforts – Energy analysts expect coal consumption in Southeast Asia and India to grow, as demand for the cheapest fuel is driving rapid economic expansion and offering big profits to investors in the electricity sector. Environmentalists across the world are watching this rebound in the coal industry with great concern because it runs counter to international efforts to reduce reliance on fossil fuels by 2050 in order to stem the rise in global temperatures. “Coal is the most carbon-intensive fossil fuel and phasing it out is a key step in achieving the emissions reductions needed to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius,” said Paola Yanguas Parra, policy analyst at Climate Analytics. Parra insisted that, in order to achieve the carbon-emission reduction milestone of the Paris Agreement, Climate Analytics research suggested that every country must stop burning coal by mid-century, so efforts to get rid of coal must start now. The Global Coal Exit List, which was released at the UN Climate Summit in Bonn, Germany, last year, revealed that more than 770 companies were still actively engaged in coal-related business, that 225 firms were planning to expand coal mining and that 282 were planning new coal-fired power stations.This revival in the coal industry has also been mentioned in leading energy-monitoring reports since 2017. The International Energy Agency (IEA) reported that coal production last year had risen by 3.1 per cent, while coal consumption in the energy sector had also increased, by 1 per cent.According to the IEA’s 2018 coal overview, higher production has been noticed in all major coal-producing countries except Germany and Poland, while global trade in coal in 2017 rose by 3.3 per cent from the year earlier. The IEA said the growth in the coal industry could be blamed on the policy reversal in the United States and greater demand for coal in China and India. These largest coal consumers have both increased their demand for cheap fuel to produce power. “Coal will still be our primary source of energy for the upcoming decades, despite renewable energy becoming the biggest competitor due to its rapid growth and cheaper cost. But I believe coal still plays an important role in ensuring the stability of the energy sector,” said Sacha Parneix, GE Power’s commercial general manager. “There is no doubt that coal has a bad reputation for being a major pollutant and it is true that the improper use of coal will have serious environmental impacts, but right now we have more advanced technologies to mitigate these limitations and allow us to safely use coal.”

Some U.S. electricity generating plants use dry cooling – EIA – Cooling systems are often the largest source of water use in power plants because of the large amount of heat that must be removed to condense the steam used to drive turbine generators. Historically, this cooling was provided by water sources such as rivers and lakes, but the number of power plants using dry cooling – a cooling system that uses little to no water – has increased in recent years. Dry cooling systems have relatively high capital costs and require more energy to operate. These factors result in lower overall power plant efficiency, but dry cooling systems use about 95% less water than wet systems. Many types of power plants generate electricity by boiling water to produce steam, which is then passed through a turbine. Plants that burn coal and biomass, nuclear plants, some natural gas plants, and even some solar facilities use this type of system. Once the steam has passed through the turbine at these plants, it must be cooled to condense back to a liquid, which is returned to the boiler or steam generator. Most steam-generating plants in the United States use water to cool and condense steam. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, electric power generation accounts for about 40% of total water withdrawals in the United States, much of which is used for cooling. More than 61% of the thermoelectric generating capacity in the United States uses recirculating cooling systems that reuse cooling water. These systems keep water in closed-loop piping so that the water can be used repeatedly. Plants that use once-through cooling systems account for 36% of U.S. thermoelectric generating capacity. These systems withdraw large amounts of water from nearby bodies of water to cool the condenser, and then they discharge the water back to the original source at higher temperatures. Dry and hybrid cooling account for 3% of U.S. thermoelectric generating capacity, most of which has come online since 2000. Dry cooling systems use ambient air to cool and condense steam. These systems are classified into two types: direct and indirect systems. In direct dry cooling systems, steam is condensed using ambient air, meaning no water is consumed. In indirect dry cooling systems, steam is condensed in conventional water-cooled condensers, but the cooling water is kept in a closed system. As a result, no water is lost to evaporation, which means very little water is used.

Electricity Costs — NYC — During The Late Summer Heat Wave — August 28, 2018 — Link here for New York state and NYC. Click on the area of the map that interests you.

ISO New England, a bit farther north, see graphic below, link here. And, yes, it will cost $300/MWh if one chooses to do laundry at noon. From wiki:In the U.S., it costs approximately 45 cents to dry a load of laundry in an electric dryer, based on a 5,600-watt dryer, 40-minute run-time, and a 12-cent-per- kilowatt-hour rate. A kilowatt-hour (kWh) is equal to the energy of 1,000 watts working for one hour. My math suggests at $300/MWh that same chore will cost about $1.00. Air conditioning? [rate calculation graphic]

Atomic weapons and nuclear power spark outrage in Georgia – Shell Bluff, Georgia, lies just across the Savannah River from a nuclear weapons facility and just down the road from an aging nuclear power plant. The river is one of the most toxic waterways in the country. The weapons facility is one of the most contaminated places on the planet, and the power plant is about to double in size. Locals are outraged.“We believe that Plant Vogtle is going to exacerbate the existing contamination that’s already in the area and make things worse,” said Lindsay Harper, deputy director of Georgia WAND, a women-led advocacy group working to end nuclear proliferation and pollution. “We believe that more money should be put toward cleaning up the contamination instead of continuing to produce more.” Organizers from Georgia WAND and other advocacy groups gathered in Atlanta Saturday to discuss Plant Vogtle and related environmental issues and to register voters. The town hall marked the first stop on a bus tour organized by environmental leaders from across the South. The Freedom to Breathe Tour will highlight environmental hazards facing marginalized communities – starting with the expansion to Plant Vogtle, the only nuclear project under construction in the country. In 2009, Southern Company began building two reactors, which are expected to go online in 2021 and 2022, respectively. The expansion has stoked fears of contamination in what is already a heavily polluted area, leading advocates to call for more testing. “We need independent monitoring in the area that can help us to paint a larger, broader picture of what’s actually going on,” Harper said. “We need more information. We need more money for information.” Both the power plant and the weapons facility across the river produce a radioactive form of hydrogen called tritium that has been tentatively linked to Down syndrome in infants. Monitoring has found “elevated levels” of tritium in the groundwater near Plant Vogtle – too little to threaten public health, officials say, but enough to raise eyebrows. Locals are also worried that pollution from the plant may be causing cancer. Epidemiologist Joseph Mangano found evidence of an uptick in infant mortality and cancer deaths in Burke County, seat of Plant Vogtle, after the facility went online in 1987. It is unclear if the power plant was responsible for the increase.

The $4.7 Billion Nuclear Bill That No One Wants to Pay — The primary owner of a power plant with two partially built nuclear reactors in South Carolina walked away from the $9 billion project last summer because of high construction costs and delays. Now no one wants to pay for it. The utility overseeing the Virgil C. Summer plant is asking ratepayers across the Palmetto State to shoulder its construction expenses of $4.7 billion, citing a law passed last decade. But local lawmakers are trying to force South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. to pick up more of the tab.A federal judge handed lawmakers an initial victory earlier this month, ruling that a temporary state-imposed rate cut for customers could stand. The utility, known by its acronym SCE&G, is appealing the decision.This dust-up is part of a larger U.S. dispute over how much public support should be provided to support nuclear power at a time when the industry is struggling to compete with lower-cost natural gas and renewable energy.