Today, the Earth got a little hotter, and a little more crowded.
Sheltering Beautiful Biodiversity, such as this Common Indian Crow Butterfly caterpillar found in Indian forests, is another reason to conserve these important carbon-storing ecosystems. Credit Maneesh Kaul at flickr
Forests: the cheapest way to store carbon
This Red Billed Parrot Will Be Protected in the new reserve in northern Peru. Source Nature and Culture International
OO Peru: Private Conservation Area Will Protect
30% Of Northern Montane Forests - Nature and Culture International (NCI) announced the creation of a nearly 67,000 -acre protected area in northern Peru, the Chicuate Chinguelas Private Conservation Area.
OO India: Nearly 24,000 Industrial Projects Replaced Forests Over 30 Years destroying 15,000 sq km of forests that cannot be replaced artificially, the government acknowledged.
When we harm forests, we harm ourselves.
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KILLER CROPS
Climate Change Clobbers Crops Credit Pawel Kopcynski at Reuters
OO Extreme Weather Increasing Level Of Toxins In Food, scientists warn. Climate change is now known to:
Related Headline:
OO Crops Are Becoming Toxic To Withstand Extreme Weather Conditions - accumulating toxins to dangerous levels that can kill livestock, and can cause cancer and other serious illnesses in humans says a UN Environment Programme report.
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HOT NEWS
OO The Heat Goes On...
2016 Likely To Be Hottest Year On Record despite a looming La Niña, the cooler counterpart of the weather phenomenon El Niño, which combined with human-caused warming to supercharge global temperature in 2015/16 and brought chaotic weather worldwide.
OO Effect Of CO2 On Warming Is Worse Than We Thought as scientists note that the record breaking heat of 2014-2016 indicates the climate is more sensitive to rising CO2 than previously thought.
Spiralling Out Of Control if we let it do so.... to see the moving version, go to the link below. Source USGS
OO Temperatures To Spiral Even Faster Than
In Recent Decades -- a widely viewed temperature spiral graph, has been projected forward to 2100, using our current carbon emissions, and shows that "things could get out of hand pretty quickly".
Meanwhile...
OO US Leads Globe In Oil Production For Third Year and in gas, both climate-changing fuels, say federal data, making the US the prime merchant of climate change, even as it commits to cutting greenhouse gas emissions.
Seeking Relief Source www.desmogblog.com
OO What Is Going On With India's Record-Breaking Hot Weather? Several factors combine to break heat records there, including global warming (GW):
- Ambient intense air pollution "cools", keeping hot temperatures stable between 1950-2010;
- New heat records indicate the pollution effect has reached its limit under continuing GW;
El Nino probably did not affect the new heat records, occurring in an area that is normally bone dry during that time.
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RISING NATIONAL COSTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE
OO US Congressional Budget Office
Warns of Fiscal Impacts of Climate Change to US lawmakers, putting the non-partisan agency at odds with Republican Party orthodoxy.
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SPEAKING OUT
OO 450+ Groups Urge U.S. Congress To Reject TPP
Over Environmental Concerns saying theTrans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal would allow fossil fuel companies to contest U.S. environmental rules in extrajudicial tribunals.
TTP language gives companies an avenue to challenge regulations that undermine investment plans, and it could chill or even curtail global efforts to trim carbon emissions.
OO Investors to UK Prime Minister: Slash Greenhouse Gases 57%
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Sheldon Whitehouse Keeps Speaking Up On Climate Change
OO RI Senator Sheldon Whitehouse's New Record:
Speaks of Climate Change Dangers to Congress 135 Times
- So Far -- they may not be listening, but that won't stop him from speaking, he says.
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A Plan to Power Every US State has been created by Mark Jacobson, to show how little space is needed for the required water, wind and solar power. Source Mark Jacobson
OO Stanford Scientist: Wind, Water, and Sunlight Can Power the Planet says Mark Z. Jacobson, solving the climate crisis, and he's outlined in detail how to do so.
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Time to Sunset Climate Changing Emissions Source pixabay at CCo Public Domain
OO Economist Nicholas Stern:
Fossil Fuel Groups Should Not Ignore Paris Climate Accord - if they do, they risk financial disaster, as fossil fuel assets become worthless, something that should also worry policy makers and central bankers.
A task force is working towards developing uniform, voluntary disclosure standards that companies can use to demonstrate they are dealing with climate-related financial risks.
Related Headline:
OO The Long Twilight Of The Big Oil Companies - major oil companies met and argued inconclusively over adapting to a future committed towards entirely cutting fossil fuel emissions, either through developing ways to cut emissions, or switch to clean energy.
Oil companies should "embrace a future of long-term decline," the Financial Times editorial says.
OO Oil And Gas Firms 'Plan More Cuts' a report suggests.
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India's Leader Promotes Solar Power throughout the country. The US needs Narendra Modi's vision. Source reneweconomy.com
OO India PM Narendra Modi: Climate Change Tops Agenda with US
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MELTDOWN
A Map Of Melting Permafrost Source www.newsweek.com
OO Melting Permafrost Is Turbocharging Climate Change in Alaska, as it releases carbon back to the atmosphere, notes this in-depth newsweek article. So far, this slow and steady unlocking of carbon from the earth remains unaccounted for in scientists' projections of future climate change.
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Pop! and Spread - the Batagaika crater likely started with an explosive release of methane (note the sheer walls at the back) 25 years ago, and widens up to 20 meters yearly as the permafrost melts, releasing yet more climate-changing gas into the atmosphere. Source www.independent.co.uk
OO 'The Gateway To The Underworld' Siberia Crater:
A Warning To Our Warming Planet - such slumps have been 'increasing in extent and intensity' in the frozen north, scientists say.
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How Climate Change Is Greening the Arctic - with each green pinpoint representing the extra greening taking place. Credit Cindy Starr at NASA
OO NASA: Global Warming Is Greening The Arctic
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Antarctica Melting, Seas Rising: purple shows recently discovered areas where the collapse of glaciers is accelerating; yellow, the latest area found where a warming ocean has sped up glacial melting and retreat since 1990. Overall, the map shows how ice is streaming off Antarctica. Source www.antarcticglaciers.org
OO Long Overlooked Area Of Antarctica Sees Major Ice Loss - over recent years, the evidence has piled up that glaciers in parts of Antarctica have been melting and retreating at an increasingly worrying - and potentially unstoppable - pace.
@@ How Warming Ocean Speeds Glacial Collapse into the Sea Source NASA Net Propulsion Lab
"West Antarctica, in general, is not only exceptionally vulnerable to retreat triggered by ocean melting at the coastline, it is happening now and it is showing no sign of slowing down," says study co-author Robert Bingham."This whole process is pretty pervasive."
Related Headline:
OO Another Part Of Antarctica Showing Signs Of Melting Glacial Retreat - is the Bellingshausen Coast in West Antarctica, four decades of data illustrate.
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Source NASA
A Slow But Long Term Cooler/Heater of Antarctica, and the world - the oceanic heat conveyor belt lags millennia behind the heating of the air and ocean surface, but is a major conveyor of heat around the planet.
BUT, because it carries so much heat so slowly, once its warmed sections reach Antarctica, it will heat the continent for thousands of years into the future, assuring substantial sea rise.
OO Ocean Conveyor Belt
Key To Sluggish Antarctic Warming - says a new study. Sections of the oceanic conveyor belt reaching Antarctica right now are colder, representing cooler temperatures of millennia past, and replace the warm water that the belt carries away.
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CORAL REEF CATASTROPHE
Then And Now: What We've Lost - up to half of corals of the northern Great Barrier Reef, a World Heritage Site, are dead; this magnificent natural wonder will take centuries to recover, if ever.
OO Bleaching Killed Up To Half The Corals
Of The Northern Great Barrier Reef scientists say, by mass bleaching in the last few months, with minor damage only to large parts of the southern areas.
The bleaching is the third to strike the reef in 18 years and the most extreme that scientists have recorded. Coral reef researcher Terry Hughes said that mortality rates were "off the scale".
Related Headline:
One of Many Great Barrier Reef Beauties - this sea slug and many other colorful creatures thrive in the healthy parts of this incredible reef, the largest in the world. Source theverybesttop10.com
OO 'Huge Wake Up Call': Third Of
Northern Great Barrier Reef Corals Dead in the huge bleaching event earlier this year.
OO Great Barrier Reef May Never Rebound To Previous Health say scientists, from the huge bleaching event that has killed off more than half its corals in some northern reefs as temperatures rise.
Algae Grows Over Recent Dead Coral at the Great Barrier Reef, preventing young corals from resettling it. Credit Dorothea Bender-Champ at ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
OO Best Protected Great Barrier Reef Corals Are Now Dead
Coral Paradise Lost - at Jarvis Island reef, as contrasted with a 2010 and 2016 photo, the latter showing bleached and dead coral. Source NOAA
OO US Coral Sanctuary Is Now A 'Graveyard'
Due To Record Warm Oceans - scientists on an expedition to Jarvis Island in the Pacific Remote Island Marine National Monument have found devastating loss of corals due to record warm ocean temperatures.
OO Thailand Closes Popular Dive Sites Over Coral Bleaching Crisis so that human overcrowding does not further stress corals undergoing bleaching from warm waters, in a rare move to shun tourism profits to protect the environment.
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FIXING CLIMATE CHANGE
@@ A Simple And Smart Way To Fix Climate Change given by Dan Miller in 2014 at a Ted talk suggests a way to profit as we tackle climate change, by finally charging those who sell and use fossil fuels - and distributing the revenues back to all of us.
The strategy is sure to speed transition to clean renewable energy. What's not to like? Check it out!
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WORSENING WILDFIRES
As The World Warms, Wildfires Worsen Warming in Alaska and elsewhere, as illustrated in this graph of rising global temperatures. Credit Jill Pelto at www.jillpelto.com
OO Spike In Alaska Wildfires Is Worsening Global Warming US says, even worse than expected, say US government researchers.
The sharp spike in Alaska's wildfires, where more than 5 million acres burned last year, are destroying a main buffer against climate change: the carbon-rich boreal forests, tundra and permafrost that have served as an enormous carbon sink.
Northern wildfires must now be recognized as a significant driver of climate change - and not just a side-effect, says a new US Geological Survey report.
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GOOD CLEAN NEWS
OO Renewable Energy Surges To Record Levels Around The World
OO A First: Developing World Invests More In Renewable Energy
Than Rich Countries a new study says.
"What is truly remarkable about these results is that they were achieved at a time when fossil fuel prices were at historic lows, and renewables remained at a significant disadvantage in terms of government subsidies", notes Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century executive Christine Lins.
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Source www.solsystems.com
OO Global Clean Energy Employment Rose 5 % In 2015 fueled by a boom in solar and wind power jobs in the U.S. 8+ million new jobs were created in 2015, says an International Renewable Energy Agency report.
OO Wind And Solar Could Meet Nearly All Midwest Energy Needs By 2050 say researchers at the Solutions Project, in the Stanford University's Atmosphere and Energy Program, led by Mark Jacobson, who says each state can hit a 100 percent renewable mix through wind, water and solar within 35 years.
OO Iowa:A Bipartisan Push To Become Leader In Wind Energy - Thanks to state officials who have long supported renewables, Iowa now leads all U.S. states in the percentage of its energy produced from wind.
OO Obama Team Pledges New Money for Clean Energy pledging, along with 20 international partners, to double funding for clean energy research and development, from $15 billion to $30 billion annually by the year 2021.
OO Uber And Millennials Help US Cities Cut Car Addiction - How? Through the growth of car-free homes, and increased car-sharing venues.
CRUISING TOWARD CLEAN CARS
Solar Electric Cars are the real clean alternative to fossil fueled cars. Source www.pvbuzz.com
OO IEA: There Are Now One Million+ Electric Cars On The World's Roads EVs are the only technology sector out of 19 "on track" to meet the International Energy Agency's 2C scenarios.
BUT, this is only good news if those EVs run on clean electricity, derived from solar and wind power, for example.
Related Headline:
OO Wireless Charging:
The Key To Unlocking An Electric Vehicle Revolution and watching it take off.
Norway Fosters Love of EVs by providing incentives to buy them. Source green.autoblog.com
OO Norway To 'Completely Ban All Petrol Powered Cars By 2025' continuing its trend towards becoming one of the most ecologically progressive countries on the planet, according to reports.
'What an amazingly awesome country', Elon Musk tweeted.
OO China: The Electric Car You Can Charge
As Easily As Your Phone is in the works at Chehejia ("Car and Home") company, under its youthful trailblazing head, Li Xiang. He aims to start selling such a commuter car by the end of 2017.
CUTTING THE GAS
OO G7 Nations Pledge To End Fossil Fuel Subsidies By 2025 - Leaders of the UK, US, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the EU urge all countries to join them in eliminating support for coal, oil and gas in a decade.
Nice, but not enough to avert worsening catastrophic climate change.
OO Russia To Up 2030 Emissions Cuts Target and get its companies to move on carbon pricing.
OO New York Assembly Approves Bill To Cut Emissions to Zero By 2050
Taking Action on Climate Washington state Governor Jay Inslee is using executive power to bypass an inactive legislature. Source www.huffingtonpost.com
OO Washington State Limits Carbon Pollution From Largest Sources via executive action by Governor Jay Inslee to push ahead with a binding cap on carbon emissions, after failing to get legislators to act.
Washington would join nearly a dozen states including California that have capped carbon pollution from industrial sources.
The proposed rule requires large industrial emitters to gradually reduce carbon emissions over time, and would cover many industries, including power plants, oil refineries, fuel distributors, pulp and paper mills and others.
OO French Oil Giant Aims To Be 20 % Low-Carbon In Investments By 2036 as part of a radical reshaping of the Total group.
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Source www.commondreams.org
OO Scottish Parliament Votes Narrowly To Ban Fracking
OO Michigan: When Coal Plants Disappeared, So Did Demand at a big power utility.
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SOCIAL REPERCUSSIONS
OO The Pace Of Environmental Damage 'Intensifying' Worldwide UN agency says.
"The kinds of problems are recognizable, they're just happening much more frequently," said the UN Environment Program's chief scientist.
Insurance Did Not Help Many Homeless by Sandy - many have not received enough compensation, despite having purchased adequate insurance, to return home.
OO Superstorm Sandy Lesson:
No Real US Disaster Safety Net - while many insurance companies profited from government assistance, many insurance customers did not. Once companies depleted their shared assets pool, compensation stopped, despite policy claims. Some homeless are still forced to pay mortgages on unfit homes.
Source fullgrownministry.com
OO How Climate Change Will Destroy Our Global Heritage - here are a few examples:
- drowning Venice and The Statue of Liberty;
- flooding Stonehenge and the ancient statues of Easter Island;
- the devastation of our undersea coral kingdoms,
- the withering of the ancient floral kingdom of South Africa;
- several studies highlight the array of threats facing 1000+ global heritage sites due to climate change.
Venice Source en.venezia.net
Related Headline:
Stonehenge Source pinterest.com
OO From Easter Island To Stonehenge, Climate Change Threatens Iconic Tourist Sites
OO Los Angeles: Rising Seas Could Swamp Crucial Infrastructure
A Spoonbill Spoons For Its Dinner in the Everglades. Source aroundthebendohio.blogspot.com
OO Rising Seas Push Too Much Salt Into The Florida Everglades and could potentially change a way of life for millions of residents in South Florida who depend on it for clean water.
Crab, Anyone? Source www.sierraculture.com
OO Acidifying Waters Put Dungeness Crabs At Risk says a new study, showing that ocean acidification, caused from CO2 dissolving into oceans, can kill and stunt young crabs, potentially jeopardizing whole populations.
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The New Normal: Wading to Deliver Baguettes in France. Credit Christian Hartmann at Reuters
OO Floods Inundate France with a photo gallery graphically illustrating the consequences.
OO France Floods: Louvre To Close As Seine Rises Further - meanwhile the rest of Europe braced for more storms and flooding.
OO Flooding Kills Dozens In Europe And Texas,
Displaces Tens Of Thousands More
Source www.cbsnews.com
OO Texas Flooding Kills 2, Leaves 3 Missing - after a storm system once again brought heavy rain and severe flooding, and numerous rivers toward historic crests, requiring evacuation.
Thai Is Dry experiencing its worst drought in 20 years. Source www.aljazeera.com
OO Severe Drought In South Asia,
Warns South Asia Groundwater Forum
OO Vietnam: Drought And 'Rice First' Policy Imperil Farmers as well as encroaching salt waters in the normally verdant Mekong Delta.
A Climate Migrant in Grinding Poverty describes Abdul Aziz, holding one of his children; he lost his home to river erosion. Credit Rafiqul Islam at IPS
OO Bangladesh's Urban Slums Swell With Climate Migrants
OO UN Envoy Warns Of Impending Sahel Climate Crisis from a toxic mix of climate change, environmental degradation, and rising terrorism.
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CLUELESS LEADERSHIP
Credit Nate Beeler at the Columbus Dispatch, modified
OO Trump Calls For 'Complete American Energy Independence' by eliminating a slew of environmental regulations, expanding fossil fuel development, killing the Paris climate deal and ending U.S. reliance on OPEC. Scared yet?
OO Donald Trump's Dangerous, Nonsensical Energy Plan Future generations will suffer if he's able to put his plan into action.
OO Five Things That Made No Sense In Trump's Big Energy Speech Only five? (D)DT said lots of fun things about climate and energy.
OO What Trump Says About Climate Change: Nothing at least, not in his speeches... How's the teleprompter lessons coming, Donny?
OO Trump Acknowledges Climate Change -- At His Golf Course - The billionaire, who called global warming a hoax, warns of its dire effects in his company's application to build a sea wall.
OO Trump Vows To Solve California's Water Crisis:
"There Is No Drought" Presto! Problem solved.
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Credit Tom Toles at the Washington Post
OO US Republican Congress Aims To Cut Climate Science and is considering significantly cutting funds for key climate change research by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in 2017.
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CLIMATE LEADERSHIP
Keep Burning, Bernie!
OO Bernie Sanders Calls For Carbon Tax;
Knocks Trump (And The Media) Over Climate Change - he asked front-runner Hillary Clinton to join his call for a carbon tax and to shine a spotlight on Donald Trump's science-challenged ruminations about the California drought, which he has mysteriously said he could end by turning "the water on."
OOHillary Clinton Aims To Boost Clean Energy On Federal Land and water, pledging a tenfold boost in electricity production from sources like wind, solar and geothermal.
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ELECTION YEAR:
If You Don't Vote For Climate Action, You Can Forget The Rest - in a climate-changing world of famine, drought, rising seas, giant storms and heat waves, there will be no security in jobs, health, wealth, or national safety. There will be chaos ensuing from increasing crises and disasters. Vote.
OO Global Warming Policies We Set Today Will Determine The Next 10,000 Years - of global warming, a new study shows -- and whether our civilization survives or not: history shows that harmful climate change has destroyed civilizations before.
This time, it could be worldwide. Let's keep "The Hunger Games" in the realm of fiction.
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GOOD IDEAS
OO Want To Help Fight Climate Change?
Start With Reproductive Rights - with overpopulation a key environmental concern, safe access to birth control, abortion and reproductive health services offer a simple solution.
"We cannot simultaneously champion fighting climate change without also fighting for the rights of women. The two are inextricably linked", argues writer Madeleine Sommerville.
Triple Win: Using Profits to Provide Needed US Family Planning - Medicines360.org is key to creating a sustainable US population and bright futures for women - AND saving taxpayers many billions yearly in community costs by preventing unintended pregnancies. Source medicines360.org
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OO This New Neighborhood Will Grow Its Own Food, Power Itself,
And Handle Its Own Waste ReGen Village, outside of Amsterdam, doesn't need a grid or food systems. It's a model for a future, fully closed-loop settlement.
OO Paint Your Homes White To Protect From Heatwaves,
Officials Warn - ever notice that this is already done on many Mediterranean islands?
OO Make Building Standards Top Priority For Tackling Climate Change, says the International Energy Agency chief to all governments worldwide.
Going Into Deep Space To Study Climate as this Falcon 9 satellite did for NOAA. Source Reuters
OO World's Space Agencies Unite To Face Climate Challenge - For the first time, space agencies of 60+ countries have agreed to engage their satellites, to coordinate their methods and their data to monitor human-induced greenhouse gas emissions.
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FOSSIL FUEL FOLLIES
Tar Sands: Far More Harmful Air Pollution emanates from them than previously suspected.
OO New Surprising Tar Sands Impact On Climate, Air Quality Found - Canada's tar sands production is one of North America's largest sources of secondary organic aerosols, says a new study -- air pollutants that affect the climate, cloud formation and public health.
The scale even surprised researchers at Environment Canada because that sort of pollution is normally associated with large cities.
OO Oil Sands Growth Makes It Nearly Impossible For Canada To Meet Paris Agreement Targets says a new report.
OO Canada: Firefighters Protect Explosive Oil Sands Infrastructure From Wildfire battling 1,100 C flames, and fighting while surrounded by the volatile, explosive chemicals and compounds critical to pumping oil.
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Not Climate-Changing, But Hazardous are the sulfur dioxide emissions from both volcanoes and fossil fuel activities. Credit Carmelo Imbesi at AP
OO 40+ Major New Sulfur Dioxide Pollution
Sources from Fossil Fuel Activities - centered mostly around Mideast oil and gas production areas, but also from power plants worldwide.
Sulfur dioxide can cause multiple harmful health and environmental impacts and even impact the climate in certain ways, typically by temporarily reducing the effects of global warming, despite its relatively short atmospheric life.
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Ready to Divest? Source www.thegreenmarketoracle.com
OO Fossil Fuel Investments Growing Riskier For Insurers a new report warns. With nearly $500 billion invested, a new analysis recommends insurance companies take a harder look at the consequences of climate change and a lower-carbon future.
OO Crystal Balls, Hard Truths Confront Bankrupt Energy Companies - tough times for fossil fuels: 3 of the 4 largest U.S. coal companies are bankrupt. 70+ small oil and gas producers have folded since 2014. Now, bigger drillers have started to join them.
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Giant Fireballs often form when oil trains derail, as this one did in West Virginia in 2015; it took nearly a week for the uncontrollable fire to burn out. Source The Associated Press
OO Oregon: Derailment Is Latest
In String Of US Oil Train Crashes - The derailment of an oil train in Oregon's Columbia River Gorge follows a string of fiery accidents in the U.S. and Canada as shipments of crude by rail have increased with more domestic oil production.
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If we do not grow sustainably,
Our children will die inhumanely.
@@ How Parents Can Help Prevent Teen Pregnancy
Teen childbearing cost US taxpayers $9+ Billion in 2010
And the costs of raising a child usually ensures decades, if not a life, of poverty for its mother.
- US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
WHAT YOU CAN DO
Help prevent unintended pregnancies in your community:
publicize where women can access affordable contraception.
They can go here to find locations:
And there are many more actions you can do, right here.
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SOLAR KEEPS DANCING
OO Californians Just Saved $192 Million Thanks to Efficiency and Rooftop Solar
Related Headline:
OO California Boasts Some of the Lowest Per-Capita Energy Usage in the U.S. says a new report.
OO How Renewables Are Competing in the Wholesale Market Without Mandates through state incentives and favorable economics.
"We're now seeing large amounts of solar in markets where we weren't seeing it before, such as Indiana, Arkansas, Idaho, Oregon and Mississippi."
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OO Shifting Economic Winds Spell Trouble for Solar Giants - the U.S. solar market is booming, but shifting economic factors could tip demand towards buying, not leasing solar panels
- Solar panel price declines;
- the extension of the federal Investment Tax Credit for solar;
- an increase in the number of lenders willing to finance solar purchases.
That could be bad news for SolarCity and Sunrun, two big solar providers that currently dominate the U.S. residential solar market.
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