Who ever saw this coming? Yesterday, a Canadian Pacific train carrying crude oil jumped the tracks in Parkers Prarie, Minnesota and immediately spilled 20,000 to 30,000 gallons of crude onto the snowy, frozen fields. Fourteen cars of the 94-car, mile-long train (stop and picture that for a moment) left the
Continue readingAuthor: Ben Jervey
DeSmogBlog: Another Judge Agrees: Atmosphere Should Be Protected As a Public Trust
Should the atmosphere be considered part of the public trust, a resource essential for our collective survival? An Iowa judge, for one, thinks that there is good reason and precedent. You may recall the story of a group of kids, working together with Our Children’s Trust, who are suing the
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Climate Disruption Tax Costs Americans Billions
Here’s a term that bears repeating: climate disruption tax. What is a climate disruption tax? It’s the cost to the American taxpayer of dealing with the impacts of climate-related weather events, as introduced by NRDC’s Dan Lashof and Andy Stevenson. The concept of a climate disruption tax is actually
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Don Blankenship, Dark Lord of Coal Country, Implicated in Upper Big Branch Mine Explosion Deaths
Just under three years ago, an explosion in the Upper Big Branch coal mine in Montcoal, West Virginia stole the lives of 29 miners. Many were quick to condemn Massey Energy — the coal giant that operated the mine — for their long record of lax safety oversight, and to
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Drop Some Climate Reality Into the Web of Denial Myths
If you spend any time at all reading online articles or blogs about climate change (and of course you do, you’re here), and you like to punish yourself by scrolling down to the comments, you know how quickly the anti-science shysters and merchants of doubt pounce. Having posted hundreds upon
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Oil Aboard! Tar Sands Industry Eyes Nexen Rail Alternative to Stalled Pipelines
Facing enormous opposition to the proposed Keystone XL and Northern Gateway pipelines, Canada’s tar sands industry is taking to the tracks to get its sticky bitumen to China. Canadian and Chinese oil companies have explored the “pipeline by rail” option for years now, but over the past month, the prospect
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Swiss Re Tallies Huge Costs of Climate Inaction
The world’s largest insurers are tallying the costs of climate inaction, and the numbers are staggering. Swiss Re announced recently that total economic losses in 2012 from “natural catastrophes and man-made disasters” — primarily weather events — should reach roughly $140 billion. Over 11,000 lives were lost due to the so-called
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Keystone XL Conflicts of Interest Piling Up
Everywhere you look up and down the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, there seems to be a conflict of interest. Over the past couple of weeks, my colleagues at OnEarth have spotlighted a couple of them. First, there was Scott Dodd’s exclusive look into Susan Rice’s finances. Rice, who
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: UN Climate Delegates Agree on Something: Geo-engineering Is No Solution
The UN’s annual climate meetings wrap up in Doha today, and though the feckless agreements are a “delight to no one,” there is one silver lining. Geo-engineering, that grand, scary global experiment of last resort, won “scant enthusiasm” from the vast majority of participants. “Let’s face it, geo-engineering has a
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Bloomberg Businessweek Gets It Right: Sandy Wasn’t "Caused" By Climate Change – It IS Global Warming
Those crazy, radical hippies at Bloomberg Businessweek have gone and done it. With the blunt, no-nonsense cover that likely already appeared on your Facebook feed or Twitter stream or Tumblr dashboard, Businessweek dared state with certainty what so many media outlets have nervously danced around in their coverage of Superstorm
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Lone Star Standoff: Texan Landowners and Climate Activists Unite to Block Keystone XL
It’s been exactly one month since eight protesters climbed into tree scaffolding some 80-feet high in the path of TransCanada’s tree-clearing troops. That acorn of an action has grown into a full-blown forest of resistance — with local landowners and climate activists joining hands (and sharing jail cells) to block
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Irony Alert: Tobacco Apologist Steve Milloy’s EPA Human Testing Scare Campaign
Oh, the irony. A guy who built his career — and fortune — by muddying the science on the health effects of smoking is now accusing the E.P.A. of harming lungs and causing heart problems. Steve Milloy, the former Big Tobacco flack who now runs the trashy haven for climate
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Northwest Tribes Speak Out Against Coal Export Terminals
A quick update on the coal train exports front (which I’m henceforth going to start calling the Asian Coal Express, unless anyone else has any better suggestions. Leave ’em in the comments!) The New York Times ran a must-read piece for anyone concerned about coal companies targeting American taxpayer-owned public
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: White House Holds Meeting to Address Coal Export Terminals
It was barely two weeks ago that we reported on the Army Corps of Engineers’ decision to “fast track” approval of the Morrow Pacific Project, a coal export terminal on the Columbia River that would move over 8 million tons of coal from rail to barge every year. This Morrow
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Oil On the Tracks: How Rail Is Quietly Picking Up the Pipelines’ Slack
We’ve talked a lot here on DeSmogBlog about oil (and tar sands crude) pipelines. You know, like the Keystone XL, which TransCanada is currently ramming through Texas, using whatever means necessary (including violence), and Enbridge’s Northern Gateway, which was just declared “dead” by one of Canada’s top newspapers. And we’ve
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Congressional Report: Impacts of Climate Pollution "A Cocktail of Heat and Extreme Weather"
Ranking members of the House Committees on Natural Resources and on Energy and Climate released a joint report earlier this week that traces the imprints of climate change on recent extreme weather patterns. With Going to Extremes: Climate Change and the Increasing Risk of Weather Disasters (pdf), Representatives Ed Markey (D-MA)
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: The Fossil 47 Percent: Freeloading Energy Companies That Pay No Income Taxes
Mitt Romney has nothing but disdain for fossil fuel companies. At least those freeloaders that are “dependent on government” and “pay no income taxes.” This is true if you believe Romney’s very own words and some very circular logic. Follow along: According to Romney, his “job is is not to
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Army Corps Fast Tracks Port of Morrow Coal Export Terminal
The Army Corps of Engineers has decided that the transfer of coal from trains onto barges in Oregon’s Columbia River is not worthy of a full environmental impact study. For now. At issue is the Morrow Pacific Project, a coal transfer facility that is a key pivot point in Ambre
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: No Breakthroughs Necessary: 95 Percent Renewable Energy Possible By 2050
It’s a commonly held belief, even within the climate action advocacy community, that significant technological breakthroughs are necessary to harness enough clean, renewable energy to power our global energy demands. Not so, says a new study published this month, which makes an ambitious case for “sustainable sources” providing 95 percent
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: First U.S. Tar Sands Mine: Six Years Digging Up Sixty-Two Acres…For Just 6 Hours Worth of Oil
How much oil can we expect to get out of the very first tar sands mine on American soil? About six hours worth. That’s how long the 4.7 million barrels of bitumen that U.S. Oil Sands Inc plans to extract from a 62-acre mine in eastern Utah would sate our
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