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Policy & Politics

10 May 2013: U.S. Web Tool Aims to Bolster
Research on Climate and Health Links

The Obama Administration this week introduced an online tool to improve research into the link between climate change and human health and promote innovative responses to future threats. As climate change triggers more extreme weather events and temperature shifts, it is becoming increasingly important to determine how these changes will affect respiratory illnesses, infectious diseases, allergies, and other human ailments, said Tom Armstrong, executive director of the U.S. Global Change Research Program. Writing on the department’s blog, Armstrong said the so-called Metadata Access Tool for Climate and Health, or MATCH, will provide an accessible portal of metadata from more than 9,000 health, environment and climate science data sets. “MATCH will help researchers and public health officials integrate the latest information from across environmental and health disciplines in order to inform more effective responses to climate and health threats,” he said.
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01 May 2013: Program Targeting Diesel
Emissions Will Be Cut by 70 Percent

A federal program that has cleaned up or removed 50,000 high-polluting diesel engines from U.S. roads is scheduled to be cut by 70 percent under President Barack Obama’s latest budget. The program eliminated 230,000 tons of soot and smog-causing pollutants, slashed more than two million tons of carbon dioxide emissions, and saved 205 million gallons of fuel. But the program’s budget has faced steady cuts in recent years, falling from $50 million in fiscal year 2011, to $20 million in 2013, to a proposed $6 million in fiscal year 2014. The diesel cleanup program has succeeded in removing only a fraction of the 11 million dirty, pre-2006 diesel vehicles on the road. But environmentalists say that the program has been successful in helping clean the air in low-income communities that often are situated near ports, highways, and other areas with high diesel traffic.
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29 Apr 2013: Ocean off the U.S. Northeast
Was Warmest in 150 Years, Report Says

Sea surface temperatures along the northeastern U.S. were warmer in 2012 than during any year in the last 150 years, a new report finds. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) latest Ecosystem Advisory for the Northeast Shelf, sea surface temperatures across the region — which extends from Cape Hatteras, N.C., to the Gulf of Maine — averaged 14 degrees C (57.2 degrees F) last year, significantly higher than the average temperature over the last three decades, which was 12.4 degrees C (54.3 degrees F). It was also the biggest one-year increase since records were first kept in 1854. While the data historically has been collected by ship-board instruments, NOAA now also incorporates satellite remote-sensing technology. “Changes in ocean temperatures and the timing and strength of spring and fall plankton blooms could affect the biological clocks of many marine species, which spawn at specific times of the year based on environmental cues like water temperature,” said Kevin Friedland, a NOAA scientist.
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26 Apr 2013: NASA Tests Affirm Viability
Of Biofuel-Powered Commercial Jets

In recent test flights, NASA researchers have confirmed that commercial airliners can safely fly on an alternative jet fuel blend and that under some conditions the biofuel mix produced 30 percent fewer emissions than typical jet fuel. After flying DC-8 aircraft using a biofuel blend containing 50 percent camelina plant oil, scientists from Langley Research Center in Virginia say they observed no noticeable difference in the jets’ engine performance. And specially equipped planes that measured the exhaust emissions from the jets’ contrails found the biofuel blend produced fewer emissions, according to NASA. “In terms of these fuels being acceptable for use in commercial aircraft, they’re quite acceptable,” Bruce Anderson, a senior research scientist at Langley Research Center, told the Associated Press. “But we’re still digging into the data.” But while camelina plant oil might eventually emerge as an attractive biofuel source, since it can be grown in arid regions, researchers noted that it is currently cost-prohibitive. Currently, Anderson said, camelina oil costs about $18 per gallon, compared to $4 per gallon for typical jet fuel.
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25 Apr 2013: Metal Demand Could Increase
Nine-Fold as Developing Economies Grow

Global demand for metals could increase nine-fold in the coming years as the world’s developing economies continue to grow, a trend that could have profound negative environmental impacts, a new UN report says. As populations in these countries continue to adopt modern technologies, and nations increasingly construct metal-intensive renewable energy projects, the need for raw metal materials will likely be three to nine times larger than the current global demand, said Achim Steiner, executive director of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). While the current demand is typically met by mining for more metals, large-scale mining operations can have adverse environmental consequences, and the supply of some rare earth metals is running low. Saying that there is an urgent need for a more sophisticated approach to recycling the planet's increasingly sophisticated products, the UN suggested that mining companies be enlisted to help sort out valuable metals when the products reach the end of their usefulness.
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22 Apr 2013: Green Energy Investments
To Triple by 2030, Analysis Predicts

Annual investment in renewable energy is predicted to triple between now and 2030, according to a report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. In an analysis of several factors shaping the global energy future — including economic conditions, market demands, and the evolution of technologies — the group predicted that annual spending may increase from $190 billion last year to $630 billion by 2030. A key factor in the growth is the plunging cost of wind and solar energy, which in the short term has bankrupted many manufacturers. The Bloomberg report also forecast significant growth in hydropower, geothermal, and biomass sources of energy. In the most likely scenario, 70 percent of new power generation capacity between 2012 and 2030 would come from renewable sources — with wind and solar accounting for 30 and 24 percent, respectively — while only 25 percent would come from fossil fuel sources.
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18 Apr 2013: Reducing Short-Lived Pollutants
Could Slow Sea Level Rise, Study Says

Reducing the emissions of four critical pollutants in the coming decades could at least temporarily slow the rate of global warming and reduce projected sea level rise by as much as 50 percent, according to a new study. Building on previous research that found that reducing the emissions of four short-lived pollutants — tropospheric ozone, hydrofluorocarbons, black carbon, and methane — could slow the rate of global warming by 50 percent, the new study projects that sea-level rise could, in turn, be reduced by 24 to 50 percent by 2100, depending on the level of emissions cuts. Unlike carbon dioxide, which persists in the atmosphere for centuries, these four pollutants remain in the atmosphere anywhere from a week to a decade, so altering their atmospheric concentrations can have a more immediate effect on the global climate, scientists say. “Society can significantly reduce the threat to coastal cities if it moves quickly on a handful of pollutants,” said Aixue Hu, a researcher at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and lead author of the study published in the journal Nature Climate Change.
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16 Apr 2013: U.S. Offshore Seismic Testing
Threatens Many Marine Species, Study Says

The proposed use of seismic air guns in the search for offshore oil and gas reserves along the U.S. East Coast could injure or kill nearly 140,000 marine animalsannually and disrupt the vital activities of other species, a new study says. The seismic testing, in which guns filled with compressed air are fired repeatedly over deep-sea target areas to provide energy companies an image of the deposits below, would threaten marine species of all sizes, from tiny fish eggs to large whales, according to an analysis by the conservation group Oceana. The group said that the powerful air gun blasts, which it describes as “100,000 times more intense than a jet engine,” could disturb the breathing, feeding, and mating habits for dolphins and whales and cause injury or death to endangered species such as the North Atlantic right whale. The analysis comes as the U.S. Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management completes a study of the potential impacts of seismic activities from Delaware to Florida. Oil industry officials point to other research that shows seismic testing is unlikely to threaten marine mammals.
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15 Apr 2013: Renewable Energy Generated
70 % Of Portugal’s Electricity in Quarter

Portugal generated more than 70 percent of its electricity from renewable sources of energy during the first quarter of 2013, a record amount fueled largely by hydroelectric and wind energy sources, according to a report from the country’s grid operator. Hydroelectric generation provided 37 percent of the nation’s electricity from January to March, a 312-percent increase compared to last year, while wind energy accounted for 27 percent, a 60-percent increase, Redes Energéticas Nacionais (REN) reported. While favorable weather helped drive the record levels in wind and hydroelectric power, the results also reflect Portugal’s investment in renewable energy projects — including wind farms, hydroelectric, solar and wave energy — and an improved electricity grid that allows green energy providers to connect into the system. Nearly 45 percent of the country’s electricity will come from green sources this year compared with just 17 percent five years ago, ThinkProgress reports.
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12 Apr 2013: Many Marine Mammal Species
Have Rebounded Since U.S. Protections

Forty years after the passage of the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA), no marine mammal species in U.S. waters has been extirpated and the populations of many marine animals are more abundant than in 1972, a new study says. While many species, including the endangered right whale, remain at significant risk, the populations of other species — including gray seals in New England and sea lions and elephant seals on the Pacific coast — have “recovered to or near their carrying capacity,” scientists say. “At a very fundamental level, the MMPA has accomplished what its framers set out to do, to protect individual marine mammals from harm as a result of human activities,” said Andrew Read, a professor at Duke University and co-author of the study, published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. Passed at a time when numerous species were on the edge of extinction, the MMPA imposed strict regulations against commercial killing and the incidental bycatch of marine mammals by the fishing industry.
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11 Apr 2013: Marine Council's ‘Eco-Labeling’
Process Is Too Lenient, Report Says

The process by which the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certifies seafood as sustainable is too lenient and discretionary, allowing for “overly generous interpretations” from third-party certifiers and adjudicators, a new report says. Launched in 1997, the UK-based MSC administers a well known eco-labeling process to inform consumers which fisheries are sustainable and provide incentives for better fisheries management. But in an analysis of 19 formal complaints against the council, a group of researchers found that several of the fisheries that received the MSC’s “sustainable” label — accounting for 35 percent of labeled seafood — apparently do not meet the council’s standards. For example, they found that Canada’s longline fishery for swordfish resulted in an extraordinary amount of incidental bycatch of other species, with the annual catch of 20,000 swordfish also netting 100,000 sharks, 1,200 endangered loggerhead turtles, and 170 leatherback turtles, according to the report, published in the journal Biological Conservation.
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10 Apr 2013: New Satellite-Based System Will
Track Illegal Deforestation in Real Time

A coalition of organizations has unveiled a digital tool its developers say will help governments, environmental groups, and local communities monitor illegal logging in the world’s forest regions in close to real time. Using satellite technology, data sharing, and a global network of local contributors, the so-called Global Forest Watch 2.0 system will enable users to track forest loss that has occurred within the last 30 days and allow local forest managers to upload geo-referenced photographs to support data on deforestation. Developed by the World Resources Institute (WRI) and other contributors — including Google, the University of Maryland, and the United Nations Environment Program — the technology was unveiled this week at a UN forum on forests and will be available next month. WRI hopes the system will allow government leaders and companies to make more timely forest management decisions.
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05 Apr 2013: South Africa Game Reserve
Poisons Rhino Horns to Halt Poachers

Officials at a private game reserve in South Africa say they have injected into the horns of more than 100 rhinos a parasiticide that will make humans sick if they ingest the horns. As the rhinos’ death toll continues to escalate in South Africa, where nearly 700 animals were poached last year to supply a growing black market for their horns, officials say bold action was necessary. “Despite all the interventions by police, the body count has continued to climb,” Andrew Parker, chief executive of the Sabi Sand Wildtuin Association, a group of private landowners, told the Guardian. “Everything we’ve tried has not been working and for poachers it has become a low-risk, high-reward ratio.” The group is trying to increase that risk by injecting a mix of parasiticides and pink dye into the horns of tranquilized rhinos. The poison is not lethal to humans, Parker said, but anyone who consumes it will be extremely ill. Demand for rhino horns in Southeast Asia, where the horns are believed to have healing powers, has triggered a surge in the killing of rhinos.
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04 Apr 2013: U.S. Company Shelves Solar
Thermal Plant as Utility Cancels Contract

U.S.-based BrightSource Energy has shelved its second major solar thermal project this year as the company and Pacific Gas and Electric terminated the utility’s contract to buy power generated by the plant in south-central California. In an email, a BrightSource spokesman said the $2.9 billion Hidden Hills project, which would have been built in Inyo County near the Nevada border, was suspended due to “uncertainty around the timing of transmission upgrades,” Bloomberg News reports, although regulators' environmental concerns also seemed to play a role. Like another project canceled by BrightSource earlier this year, the 500-megawatt Hidden Hills plant would have utilized thousands of mirrors reflecting sunlight onto central towers to produce steam. The California Energy Commission, which was reviewing the project, found last year that the solar installation would have “significant” environmental impacts, suggesting that the use of photovoltaic solar panels would be “environmentally superior.” Officials at BrightSource, which recently completed a solar thermal plant in the Mojave desert, disputed that analysis.
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28 Mar 2013: California City to Require
Solar Energy Systems on All New Homes

A city in southern California this week passed a zoning regulation that requires developers to install solar power systems on every new house they build. Beginning next year, all new homes built on lots at least 7,000 square feet in size in Lancaster, Calif. will be required to produce at least one kilowatt of solar electricity. Developers also have the option of purchasing solar energy credits from other developments within the city limits. The new zoning rules are the latest initiative in Mayor Rex Parris’s quest to make Lancaster, which has a population of 150,000 and abundant sunshine, the “solar capital of the universe.” Since 2008, the city has also introduced an initiative to attract utility-scale solar developers to the city, proposed a transmission project to deliver solar-generated power to other communities, and created a solar financing program for homeowners, businesses, and nonprofits.
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26 Mar 2013: China’s Utility Giants
Vulnerable to Water Scarcity, Report Says

China’s five largest power utilities, which depend on water-intensive, coal-fired stations to generate electricity, are vulnerable to water supply disruptions because they are centered in the country’s water-scarce northern regions, a new report says. According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the five power generators — Huaneng, Datang, Huadian, Guodian, and China Power Investment — operate hundreds of gigawatts of thermal plants in the industrial northeast, where water resources are increasingly strained. Eighty-five percent of China’s power-generating capacity is in water scarce regions, said Maxime Serrano Bardisa, one of the report’s coauthors. The report said that major technical and policy shifts will be required to avert serious disruptions, including the addition of systems that use less water, such as closed-cycle or air-cooled systems. Such improvements could cost the utilities $20 billion in retrofit costs, the report said.
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22 Mar 2013: Expansion of Chinese City Poses
Environmental and Safety Risks, Critics Say

An ambitious plan to expand the western Chinese city of Lanzhou into a regional industrial hub is raising concerns over what critics call lax government oversight of the environmental and safety impacts, including worries that it will siphon huge amounts of water from an already parched region and devastate nearby mountains. Lanzhou, the capital of Gansu Province, is a city of 3.6 million and a gateway to Tibet and the Xinjiang region. It is known as one of the most polluted cities in China, and now the government is working to expand the city’s footprint by at least 70 percent, according to Caixin Online. That expansion involves the flattening of mountaintops, and the additional 1 million people and increased industrial activity will draw water from the already polluted and over-stressed Yellow River. Opponents of the plan say buildings will also be constructed on loose soil that will be vulnerable to collapse. “It was a rash decision to begin construction on the new city before receiving environmental approvals or seeking opinions from the Lanzhou public,” said Zhao Zhong, a local activist.
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20 Mar 2013: High-Speed Trains Provide
Environmental, Social Benefits, Study Says

Bullet trains fuel real-estate booms, improve quality of life, reduce air pollution and traffic congestion, and provide a “safety valve” for crowded cities, especially in the developing world, according to a study by Chinese and U.S. economists. The study was based on China’s rapidly expanding high-speed rail network, but the researchers said the benefits experienced there would be similar for California’s proposed high-speed rail system. Bullet train systems connecting China’s largest cities to nearby smaller cities have made these “second tier” cities more attractive for workers and alleviated traffic congestion and pollution in megacities, according to the study, carried out by economists at Tsinghua University and the University of California, Los Angeles. The study found that the trains created a new category of exurbs within 60 to 470 miles of urban centers such as Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, helping keep people from moving to already crowded megacities. The study was published in the online version of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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18 Mar 2013: New Chinese Premier
Vows To Tackle Pollution With ‘Iron Fist’

China’s new premier, Li Keqiang, has vowed aggressive government action to curb the rampant pollution that has provoked growing public outrage, saying the country would phase out “backward production facilities” that have contributed to dangerous health conditions in numerous regions. Speaking at his first press conference, Li said the government would set deadlines to address the public health controversy, exemplified by choking air pollution over Beijing that has kept air quality at dangerous levels since the beginning of the year. Chronic air pollution problems in major metropolitan areas, coupled with a recent episode in which more than 12,000 rotting pig carcasses were discovered in a river that provides Shanghai’s drinking water, have triggered growing public protest. While Li offered few specific solutions, he promised “vigorous” efforts to tackle pollution. “We need to face the situation and punish offenders with no mercy and enforce the law with an iron fist,” he said. “We shouldn’t pursue economic growth at the expense of the environment.”
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15 Mar 2013: Obama Unveils New Actions
To Combat Climate Change in Second Term

Making good on his promise to fight climate change more aggressively in his second term, President Obama is unveiling two major initiatives to reduce the U.S.’s reliance on fossil fuels, including a new $2 billion Energy Security Trust to fund the next generation of green vehicles, as well as new reviews of federal projects to assess their climate impacts. During an appearance at Argonne National Laboratory, Obama unveiled details of the proposed energy trust, which would shift $2 billion in royalties from oil and gas operations on federal lands into research into vehicles powered by renewable energy sources. An administration official said the policy will keep the U.S. at the forefront of the emerging green technology sector and will help the nation wean itself off fossil fuels. Obama is also expected to expand a Nixon-era law to require federal agencies to assess the climate effects of large projects, including pipelines and highways.
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14 Mar 2013: U.S. Grants Will Promote
Small-Scale, Modular Nuclear Reactors

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) this week announced a new series of cost-sharing grants to promote the development of small-scale, factory-made nuclear reactors, an emerging energy source that Obama administration officials say could help replace the coal-fired plants expected to cease operations in the coming decades. The administration, which has allocated $452 million for the program, hopes to spur the production and licensing of as many as 50 so-called modular reactors annually by 2040, said Rebecca Smith-Kevern, director of light water reactor technology at the DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy. DOE officials say these modular reactors, which would be about one-third the size of typical nuclear power plants, also include scalable designs that will provide safety and economic benefits. “We have a vision of having a whole fleet of [modular reactors] produced in factories,” Smith-Kavern said at a conference. “We envision the U.S. government to be the first users.” Citing a 2011 paper, she said plants could cost $3 billion to $5 billion apiece.
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Interview: An Advocate for
Environmental Justice at EPA

Matthew Tejada brings on-the-ground experience to his new job as director of the Office of Environmental Justice at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Tejada, 33, took over his EPA post this month after leading Air Alliance Houston, where he helped organize communities along the Texas Gulf Coast to fight air pollution from chemical plants, oil refineries, and the shipping industry. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, Tejada explains how he sees his role at the EPA as an advocate for environmental justice, a concept that first emerged in the 1980s and focuses on the pollution burdens often placed on poor and minority neighborhoods. Tejada tells e360 why he thinks his work as a community advocate will help in his new job, why it is important for environmental organizations to build coalitions with grassroots groups, and how he sees “similarities across environmental justice communities, whether they’re in Puerto Rico or in Kansas.”
Read the interview
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12 Mar 2013: Mass Scale of Renewables Shift
Is Evident in Blueprint for New York State

A new study concludes that it would be technically and economically feasible for New York State to meet all of its energy needs from renewable sources by 2030, but researchers say the transition would involve building wind, solar, and other alternative energy sources on a mass scale. Writing in the journal Energy Policy, a team of researchers said that to wean itself from fossil fuels for electricity production and transportation, the state would need to build more than 4,000 onshore wind turbines, 12,700 offshore turbines, 828 photovoltaic plants, 5 million rooftop solar systems, and 2,600 one-megawatt tidal turbines. If implemented, New York would meet 40 percent of its energy needs with wind power and 38 percent from solar, the study said. While this dramatic conversion would require initial capital expenses, the study predicts that the long-term health benefits and new jobs would more than make up for those costs. The transition would also reduce end-use power demand by 37 percent, prevent 4,000 premature deaths annually, and save $33 billion in health costs each year, the researchers said.
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06 Mar 2013: Atmospheric CO2 Concentration
Shows Second-Largest Annual Increase

The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere increased by 2.67 parts per million in 2012, marking the second-biggest jump since levels were first recorded in 1959 and decreasing the chances that the planet will avoid a dangerous temperature increase of 3.6 degrees F (2 C) or higher, U.S. scientists say. The new data, collected in Mauna Loa, Hawaii, suggests that levels of heat-trapping CO2 are now just under 395 parts per million (ppm) and could hit 400 ppm within two years, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The one-year increase was second only to 1998, when CO2 concentrations jumped by 2.84 parts per million; pre-industrial atmospheric concentrations of CO2 were 280 ppm. Pieter Tans, a senior scientist at NOAA's Climate Monitoring and Diagnostics Laboratory, attributed the latest spike to an increase in fossil fuel burning globally, particularly in China. “It’s just a testament to human influence being dominant,” he told the Associated Press.
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05 Mar 2013: African Forest Elephant
Populations Fell 62 Percent in a Decade

Populations of forest elephants in central Africa plummeted by more than 60 percent from 2002 to 2011, with dwindling habitat and an acceleration in poaching driving the elephants toward extinction, according to a new study. An international team of 60 scientists found that while elephants historically ranged across a 772,000-square-mile region in Cameroon, Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon and the Republic of Congo, they now exist in just 25 percent of that area, said John Hart, scientific director for the Lukuru Foundation and co-author of the study published in the journal PLoS ONE. The decade-long survey, which involved the work of many local conservation staff members who walked more than 8,000 miles conducting censuses, is the largest ever conducted on forest elephants. According to the survey, the remaining 100,000 forest elephants are increasingly scarce in regions with high human populations, heavy poaching, and weak governance.
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04 Mar 2013: U.S. Educational Standards
To Urge Teaching About Climate Change

A new set of U.S. educational standards that is expected to be released this month will recommend that global warming be included in the science curriculum for all U.S. public schools. The Next Generation Science Standards, which are being developed by a coalition that includes the National Research Council and 26 individual U.S. states, will recommend that teachers introduce evidence of human-caused climate change in all science classes, beginning in elementary school, according to Inside Climate News. According to the standards, by eighth grade all students should understand that “human activities, such as the release of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, are major factors in the current rise in Earth’s mean surface temperature.” With an additional 15 states indicating that they will also adopt the standards, the report says, the U.S.’s biggest educational publishing companies are already expected to incorporate the new standards into their textbooks and other teaching materials.
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27 Feb 2013: Oxfam Ranks Food Giants on
Sourcing and Environmental Policies

The group Oxfam has published an online scorecard assessing the agricultural sourcing of the world’s biggest food and beverage companies, rating them on factors that include water resource management, climate awareness, and transparency. Using publicly available information, the “Behind the Brands” campaign rates the 10 companies with the largest overall revenues — including Nestlé, PepsiCo, Unilever, Mars, and General Mills — on their awareness and responsiveness to these issues and supply chain management. According to Oxfam's analysis, Europe-based companies Nestlé and Unilever earned the highest scores overall, receiving good marks for water management and workers’ rights. Seven of the 10 companies received the lowest possible score for land management. Associated British Foods, Kellogg’s, and General Mills received the lowest overall scores. Oxfam says the scoreboard will be updated regularly.
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19 Feb 2013: New Global Standard Aims
To Reduce Water Waste by Businesses

The UK-based Carbon Trust has introduced what it calls the first global standard on water management and reduction in hopes of encouraging more sustainable water use by businesses. The new standard, created by members of the group along with four early-adopting companies, including Coca-Cola Enterprises, will require businesses to show that they are measuring their water use and reducing consumption on a year-to-year basis, Carbon Trust executive Tom Delay told BBC News. “We look at the various water supply methods: mains, surface water abstraction, groundwater, and rainwater collection,” he said. The Carbon Trust, which already helps business and governments reduce energy use and carbon emissions, decided to expand into water issues since freshwater scarcity is closely linked with climate change. According to a 2009 report, global freshwater demand will outpace currently available supplies by 40 percent by 2030. In a survey of 475 companies in the U.S., UK, China, and Brazil, the Carbon Trust found that just one out of seven businesses have set targets for water reduction and report their performances publicly.
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Why I Came to Washington to
Protest the Keystone Pipeline

By Rick Bass

It’s not exactly as if hell has frozen over, for me, an oil and gas geologist to be protesting — maybe even beyond the extent allowable by law — the folly of the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline. I’ve hugged a tree or two before, written some letters opposing this or that dam, mine, clear-cut, or whatnot. I’ve lived the last 26 years in the backwoods of northwest Montana, writing pretty little stories, poems and essays about the million-acre garden of the Yaak Valley, a lush wild rainforest of a place, in which I’ve pleaded, argued, scolded for its protection.
Read more
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14 Feb 2013: Two New Polls Show Strong
Support for Obama Action on Climate

Roughly two-thirds of the American people support President Obama taking significant action on climate change, according to two polls released the day after Obama’s State of the Union address. A poll for the League of Conservation voters showed that 65 percent of Americans want Obama to take “significant steps” to address climate change, including 89 percent of Democrats, 62 percent of Independents, and 38 percent of Republicans. The survey said that most Americans view climate change as a tangible threat, with 61 percent saying climate change is already affecting them or will affect them sometime in their lives. A second poll, conducted for the Natural Resources Defense Council, found that 65 percent of Americans see climate change as a serious problem and that 62 percent agreed with Obama’s call for action. Obama told Congress that if it does not pass legislation to reduce CO2 emission, he will step up efforts to deal with the problem using executive actions. Despite these poll results, another recent survey showed that Americans rank climate change last on a list of 21 problems facing the U.S.
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