Another Week of GW News, April 8, 2012

Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years

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Another week of Climate Disruption News

Information is not Knowledge...Knowledge is notWisdom

April 8, 2012

• Chuckles, Shakun, DeConto, Maldives, Elgin
• Heatwave, Earth Hour, CPDN, SREX, Subsidies, Cook
• Fukushima Note, Fukushima News, Nuclear Policy
• Melting Arctic, Polar Bears, Geopolitics, Antarctica
• Food Crisis, Fisheries, Food Prices, IP Issues, GMOs, Food Production
• Hurricanes, GHGs, Nitrogen Cycle, Temperatures, Jet Streams
• Aerosols, Clouds, Paleoclimate, ENSO, Solar, Satellites
• Impacts, Forests, Disease, Wacky Weather, Extreme Weather
• Phenology, Tornadoes, Corals, Glaciers, Sea Levels, Floods & Droughts
• Mitigation, Transportation, Buildings, Sequestration, Adaptation
• Journals, Misc. Science, Models, Free Science, Hansen, Mann, Pielke, Curry
• International Politics: UN, Carbon Trade, Hormuz, EU ETS & Airlines
• Solar Spat, Malvinas, Security, Activism, H2O Biz, Software
• National Politics: America, BP Disaster, 2012, Keystone
• War On Women, Monnett, Obama, USAdmin, Congress
• Britain, Europe, Australia, MDBP, New Zealand, India, Asia, South America
• Canada, Post G20, Budget, Streamlining, Muzzling, Northern Gateway
• MackenzieVP, BC, Tar Sands, Alberta, Sask, Ontario, Canadiana
• Ecological Economics, IPAT, Media, Books, Video, Courts
• Energy, Fracking, Coal, Oil & Gas, Pipelines, Peak Oil, Biofuel, Wind, Solar, Nukes
• Nuclear Waste, Nuclear Fusion, Grid, Efficiency, Cars, Gee Whiz, Energy Storage
• Business, Insurance, FAQs, Joe's List, Michael's List, Carbon Lobby, Misc., Useful Links
• Shameless Self Promotion, .sig

Laugh. I dare ya:

• 2012/04/07: SMcMillan: (cartoon - McMillan) Self Sabotage
• 2012/04/07: uComics: (cartoon - Danziger) GOP In Turmoil
• 2012/04/08: uComics: (cartoon - Toles) Let The Fight Begin
• 2012/04/03: Grist: All the insanity of modern car culture, in one image
• 2012/04/02: uComics: (cartoon - Toles) Evidence Is That Increased Extreme Weather ...

  And for those who enjoy challenging Poe's Law:

• 2012/04/02: Onion: Romney To Travel Back In Time To Kill Liberal Versions Of Himself

  There will be a lot of noise about the Shakun et al. paper:

• 2012/04/04: Nature: (ab$) Global warming preceded by increasing carbon dioxide concentrations during the last deglaciation by Jeremy D. Shakun et al.
• 2012/04/06: CCP: Global warming preceded by increasing carbon dioxide concentrations during the last deglaciation, Nature 484, Jeremy D. Shakun et al.
• 2012/04/06: PSinclair: Plain Spoken Scientist on Climate Change Implications: "Holy ***t!"
• 2012/04/05: P3: No Real Lag between Global T and CO2
• 2012/04/06: KSJT: Lots of Ink: Reporters don't multitask? Nature papers says wait a minute -- CO2 changes DID lead ancient warmings. That's TWO papers.
• 2012/04/05: CSM: Ice age study delivers blow to global-warming skeptics
  Rising levels of carbon dioxide drove much of the global warming that thawed Earth at the end of the last ice age. That's the conclusion a team of scientists has drawn in a new study examining the factors that closed the door on the last ice age, which ended about 20,000 years ago.
• 2012/04/05: CBC: Last ice age ended by carbon dioxide increase -- Climate skeptics' popular argument discredited by clear global trend
• 2012/04/05: PSinclair: (Re)Confirmed: Earth's Wobble, Plus CO2, Ended Last Ice Age
• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au): Carbon dioxide ended last Ice Age: study
• 2012/04/05: ClimateShifts: Plain speaking from Matt England
• 2012/04/05: ClimateShifts: Carbon dioxide ended last Ice Age: study
• 2012/04/05: Eureka: Confirming carbon's climate effects
  Researcher helps paint the fullest picture yet of how increases in CO2 helped end the ice age
• 2012/04/04: CSM: Increasing carbon dioxide levels ended the last ice age
• 2012/04/04: BBC: CO2 'drove end to last ice age'
  A new, detailed record of past climate change provides compelling evidence that the last ice age was ended by a rise in temperature driven by an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide.
• 2012/04/04: Guardian(UK): Study suggests rising CO2 in the past caused global warming [Shakun et al.]
  A paper in Nature shows how increased CO2 in the atmosphere led to warming -- rather than the other way round
• 2012/04/04: SimpleC: Global view answers ice age CO2 puzzle
• 2012/04/04: NatureN: How carbon dioxide melted the world -- Global data set shows that rising greenhouse-gas levels drove the end of the last ice age
• 2012/04/04: SciNow: Greenhouse Gas Is No Weakling
  A simple interpretation of Antarctic ice-core records, the one preferred by global warming skeptics, portrays carbon dioxide as a weak, even inconsequential player in the warming that brought the world out of the last ice age. But the first continuous, near-global record of temperature as the last ice age ended now shows that carbon dioxide did indeed help warm the world.
• 2012/04/04: Eureka: Rising CO2 levels linked to global warming during last deglaciation

  DeConto et al. say the danger is the permafrost locked carbon, not methane hydrates:

• 2012/04/04: Nature: (ab$) Past extreme warming events linked to massive carbon release from thawing permafrost by Robert M. DeConto et al.
• 2012/04/06: CCP: Past extreme warming events linked to massive carbon release from thawing permafrost, Nature 484, Robert M. DeConto et al.
• 2012/04/04: UMass: Thawing Permafrost 50 Million Years Ago Led to Global Warm Events, Says Team Led by UMass Amherst Climate Modeler
  [...]
  "The standard hypothesis has been that the source of carbon was in the ocean, in the form of frozen methane gas in ocean-floor sediments," DeConto says. "We are instead ascribing the carbon source to the continents, in polar latitudes where permafrost can store massive amounts of carbon that can be released as CO2 when the permafrost thaws."
• 2012/04/07: CCurrents: Past Extreme Warming Events Linked To Massive Carbon Release From Thawing Permafrost
• 2012/04/05: SciNow: Did Melting Antarctic Permafrost Drive Ancient Global Warming?
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: Nature Bombshell: 'Past Extreme Warming Events Linked To Massive Carbon Release From Thawing Permafrost'
• 2012/04/04: Eureka: Thawing permafrost 50 million years ago led to global warming events -- Researchers propose new mechanism of past global warming
• 2012/04/04: Eureka: Thawing permafrost may have led to extreme global warming events [PETM]

  Looks like the Maldives are heading back into dictatorship:

• 2012/04/01: Guardian(UK): 'Dictatorship is coming back to the Maldives and democracy is slipping away'
  Mohamed Nasheed was busy campaigning to reduce global carbon emissions and counter the climate change that would drown his country. But then he resigned the presidency. At gunpoint

The Elgin Gas Leak in the North Sea continues:

• 2012/04/05: CCP: A cloud of fear: Greenpeace releases infrared image of giant 'explosive' methane gas spewing from Elgin rig in North Sea
• 2012/04/04: GreenGrok: North Sea Well Blowout Spikes Carbon Emissions
• 2012/04/04: PlanetArk: Total To Send Expert Team To Assess Gas Leak Soon
• 2012/04/03: NYT: Oil Company Says [Elgin] Gas Leak Costs $2.5 Million a Day
  Total, the French oil company, said Monday that a natural gas leak off the coast of Scotland was costing it $2.5 million a day and that it was too early to say when it could be stopped.
• 2012/04/02: DerSpiegel: Elgin Leak Points to Drilling Risks -- Perils and Price Rise in Hunt for Natural Gas
  The Elgin natural gas drilling operation was highly dangerous but fruitful -- until it sprung an unexpected leak that nearly caused an environmental disaster. The out-of-control situation highlights increasingly risky "extreme drilling" efforts to extract the valuable fuel from deep below the North Sea.
• 2012/04/03: PlanetArk: Total's Battle To Plug Gas Leak Hit By Rough Seas
• 2012/04/02: PlanetArk: Flare On Total's Elgin Platform Extinguished: CEO
• 2012/04/02: PlanetArk: Signs Of Trouble At Leaking Total Gas Rig Month Before
• 2012/04/02: OilChange: Gas Leak was "Impossible" Workers Told

  There's still some chatter about the March heatwave in North America:

• 2012/04/04: P3: What Just Happened
  Somebody needs to write a straight news article about Summer-In-March, climate science, and climate change. No snark, no trickery, no exagerration, no personality. Just the facts, most important first. Herewith, my attempt.
• 2012/04/03: ClimateSight: Climate Change and Heat Waves
• 2012/04/03: TP:JR: March Heat Records Crush Cold Records by Over 35 To 1, Scientists Say Global Warming Loaded The Dice

  Earth Hour retrospectives:

• 2012/04/03: CAW: Earth Hour a World-wide Sucess
• 2012/03/30: SciAm: 'Earth Hour' Pauses at U.S. Border -- A global effort to turn off the lights for an hour has yet to catch on in America
• 2012/03/31: Guardian(UK): Earth Hour 2012 - in [17] pictures

  Late comment on CPDN:

• 2012/04/02: JEB: Broad range of warming by 2050?

  Late comment on SREX:

• 2012/04/02: STimes: Scientists cite global warming for more heat waves, heavier rainfall

  Who's getting the subsidies?

• 2012/04/05: PI:B: Fossil fuel subsidies are not the best way to reduce home energy costs
• 2012/04/05: TP:JR: Bill McKibben: How You Subsidize The Energy Giants To Wreck The Planet
• 2012/04/05: Grist: Subsidies 101: A guide to corporate handouts, and why we shouldn't stand for them

  John Cook and friends continue their point-counterpoint articles:

• 2012/04/08: SkeptiSci: Climate Scientists take on Richard Lindzen by dana1981
• 2012/04/07: SkeptiSci: Submerged Forests off the coast of Wales: a Climate Change Snapshot by John Mason
• 2012/04/05: SkeptiSci: Eocene Park: our experiment to recreate the atmosphere of an ancient hothouse climate by Andy S
• 2012/04/05: SkeptiSci: Monckton Misleads California Lawmakers - Now It's Personal (Part 2) by dana1981
• 2012/04/04: SkeptiSci: Why David Archibald is wrong about solar cycles driving sea levels (Part 1) by Alex C
• 2012/04/03: SkeptiSci: New research from last week 13/2012 by Ari Jokimäki
• 2012/04/03: SkeptiSci: Yes Happer and Spencer, Global Warming Continues by dana1981
• 2012/04/01: SkeptiSci: Weather records due to climate change: A game with loaded dice by John Hartz

  A note on theFukushima disaster:

  It is evident that the Fukushima disaster is going to persist for some time. TEPCO says 6 to 9 months. The previous Japanese Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, said decades. Now the Japanese government is talking about 30 years. [Whoops, that has now been updated to 40 years.] We'll see. At any rate this situation is not going to be resolved any time soon and deserves its own section.
  Meanwhile...
  It is very difficult to know for sure what is really going on at Fukushima. Between the company [TEPCO], the Japanese government, the Japanese regulator [NISA], the international monitor [IAEA], as well as independent analysts and commentators, there is a confusing mish-mash of information. One has to evaluate both the content and the source of new information.
  How knowledgeable are they [about nuclear power and about Japan]?
  Do they have an agenda?
  Are they pro-nuclear or anti-nuclear?
  Do they want to write a good news story?
  Do they want to write a bad news story?
  Where do they rate on a scale of sensationalism?
  Where do they rate on a scale of play-it-down-ness?
  One fundamental question I would like to see answered:
  If the reactors are in meltdown, how can they be in cold shutdown?

  Not much good news coming out of Fukushima:

• 2012/04/06: JapanToday: TEPCO workers quitting due to threats, sense of despair
• 2012/04/06: MLynas: Fukushima's impact on the ocean environment revealed
• 2012/04/03: AkioMatsumura: Fukushima Daiichi Site: Cesium-137 is 85 times greater than at Chernobyl Accident
• 2012/04/06: EneNews: Ambassador Murata writes to UN Secretary General: "It is no exaggeration to say that the fate of Japan and the whole world depends on No. 4 reactor" - Appeals for independent assessment team
• 2012/04/06: EneNews: Tepco gets gov't warning about radioactive leak from Fukushima Daiichi -- "At this time we have reserved the right to not provide an English version due to potential misunderstandings"
• 2012/04/06: EneNews: Former Japan Ambassador Warns Gov't Committee: "A global catastrophe like we have never before experienced" if No. 4 collapses -- Common Spent Fuel Pool with 6,375 fuel rods in jeopardy -- "Would affect us all for centuries"
• 2012/04/05: PlanetArk: Japan Holds Off On Decision To Restart Reactors
• 2012/04/04: PlanetArk: Japan Holds Off On Decision To Restart Reactors
• 2012/04/05: EneNews: Tepco: Strontium leaking into ocean -- Tons more highly contaminated water enters sea -- "TEPCO has apologized for the incident and says it will determine the cause and extent of the leakage"
• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au): Radioactive water leaks from Fukushima plant
  About 12 tonnes of water contaminated with radiation has leaked from Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. Plant operator TEPCO believes most of the water flowed into the Pacific Ocean. It says the contaminated water leaked from a treatment pipe.
• 2012/04/04: EneNews: Kyodo: Storm may have halted nitrogen injections at three Fukushima reactors for hours -- Tepco says no fears of hydrogen explosion
• 2012/04/03: EneNews: Over 100°C? New Tepco data shows temperature spiked at two gauges in Reactor No. 2 -- Similar rise patterns for both charts
• 2012/04/02: ArsTechnica: Lots of radioactivity, but little risk in oceans, seafood near Fukushima
• 2012/04/02: PlanetArk: Japan To Lift Entry Ban On Some Fukushima Cities
• 2012/04/02: Eureka: Dartmouth scientists track radioactive iodine from Japan nuclear reactor meltdown
• 2012/04/02: EneNews: Mainichi Expert Sr. Writer: Gov't sources say No. 4 pool a grave concern - Storage pool barely intact - We have no time to humor senseless thinking of those who downplay the risks

  Post Fukushima, nuclear policies are in flux around the world:

• 2012/04/05: CSM: World is ignoring most important lesson from Fukushima nuclear disaster by Kenichi Ohmae
  [...]
  The most important lesson of Fukushima No.1 plant, therefore, is that we should have a multiplicity of means to provide a continuous electric supply and heat sinks
• 2012/04/02: al Jazeera: Japan fails to revamp nuclear regulator
  Cabinet had endorsed bill to create a powerful and independent body by April 1 to unify safety and regulatory roles. Japan has failed to create a revamped nuclear regulatory agency by the promised date of April 1, raising questions about its commitment to bolster oversight in the wake of last year's crisis. Authorities have been accused of lax regulation and supervision of Japan's 54 nuclear reactors after a massive earthquake and tsunami led to a meltdown of three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in the world's worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl. Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's cabinet has endorsed a bill to create a more powerful and independent regulatory body that would unify various nuclear safety and regulatory offices and be placed under the environment agency. Currently, the main regulatory body, the Nuclear Industrial and Safety Agency (NISA), is under the control of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, which also promotes nuclear power in the resource-poor country. But progress in setting up the new agency has been slowed by disagreements between the ruling and opposition parties over how much independence it should have, as well by unrelated disputes such as a proposed sales tax hike.

The Arctic melt continues to garner attention:

• 2012/04/06: CCP: Satellites show thawing of Alaska's permafrost [Doug O'Harra, Alaska Dispatch]
• 2012/04/06: CCP: ESA: Signs of thawing permafrost revealed from space
• 2012/04/06: ASI: PIOMAS April 2012
• 2012/04/04: ERW: Insight: climate change could boost greenhouse-gas emissions from thawing permafrost
  The highest concentrations of atmospheric methane and carbon dioxide are found in the Arctic, north of the areas where the most man-made methane and carbon dioxide are created. Our recent analyses suggest that during the Holocene and previous "warm stages", thawing of subsea permafrost (including disturbance of gas hydrates and bottom erosion), degradation of onshore permafrost (caused by coastal erosion, for example), and the formation and evolution of thawing lakes are also responsible for the Arctic increase in these gases.
• 2012/04/03: ERW: Arctic ground measurements confirm satellite data
  After 12 years of monitoring vegetation across two 1500 km Arctic transects, an international group of researchers has found good correlation between ground and satellite data
• 2012/04/04: ArcticNews: NSDIC Arctic Sea Ice News & Analysis
• 2012/04/06: ASI: Long-term regional graphs
• 2012/04/05: NSIDC: Arctic sea ice enters the spring melt season
• 2012/04/05: ASI: Arctic Sea Ice News April 4th
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: Arctic Warming Favors Extreme, Prolonged Weather Events 'Such As Drought, Flooding, Cold Spells And Heat Waves'
• 2012/04/04: NAS: Lessons and Legacies of the International Polar Year 2007-2008 (2012) : Division on Earth and Life Studies
• 2012/04/03: UMass: UMass Amherst Geoscientist, Co-Author of National Research Council Report, Briefs Federal Agencies on the State of Polar Regions

  As for the charismatic megafauna:

• 2012/04/07: ASI: Good news for polar bears
• 2012/04/07: ABC(Au): Polar bears succumb to mystery disease
  Symptoms of a mysterious disease that has killed scores of seals off the US state of Alaska and infected walruses are now showing up in polar bears. Nine polar bears from the Beaufort Sea region near Barrow were found with patchy hair loss and oozing sores on their skin, similar to conditions found in diseased seals and walruses, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said on Friday.
• 2012/04/07: EneNews: USGS issues announcement about polar bears with oozing sores, hair loss in Alaska - Gov't testing for radiation - 3 of 4 captured yesterday affected - Similar symptoms as recent mystery seal deaths (photo & audio)
• 2012/04/04: G&M: Healthy polar bear count confounds doomsayers
  The debate about climate change and its impact on polar bears has intensified with the release of a survey that shows the bear population in a key part of northern Canada is far larger than many scientists thought, and might be growing.

As for the geopolitics of Arctic resources:

• 2012/04/07: ENN: The Arctic is getting more militarized
• 2012/04/04: EurActiv: Melting Arctic may redraw global geopolitical map
• 2012/04/04: PlanetArk: Melting Arctic May Redraw Global Geopolitical Map
• 2012/04/04: PostMedia: Arctic nations' military leaders to talk polar issues in Canada
  In stark contrast to simmering fears that a new kind of "Cold War" is emerging between oil-hungry Arctic nations, Canada's Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Walter Natynczyk, is preparing to host his counterparts from seven other northern countries next week in Labrador for two days of talks on polar issues "of mutual interest," Postmedia News has learned. The planned gathering of the world's top Arctic military officials - including the defence chiefs or senior northern commanders from Canada, the U.S., Russia, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Iceland - is scheduled to take place April 12-13 at Canadian Forces Base Goose Bay in Newfoundland and Labrador.

While in Antarctica:

• 2012/04/05: RawStory: Antarctic [Larsen B] ice shelf shrunk by 85 percent since 1995
• 2012/04/05: ESA: Satellite observes rapid ice shelf disintegration in Antarctic

  The food crisis is ongoing:

• 2012/04/06: AllAfrica: ZimIndependent: Zimbabwe: Drought - Policy Failure Worsens Situation
  The sight of withering maize crop of uneven height along the Gutu-Masvingo road is striking. Subsistence communal farmers have seen their optimism and hopes of a good harvest gradually fade giving way to despair as they watched their maize crop wilt into a complete write off. Not that it's anything new in these areas surrounding districts like Gutu, Bikita, Zaka and Chivi located in one of the most drought-prone geographical regions of the country, but 2012 has been worse and there are fears it might deteriorate to catastrophic levels of the 1992 drought. In 1992, the country experienced a severe drought resulting in human and livestock fatalities. Climatically, these area falls under natural region III. Natural regions in Zimbabwe's context are areas delineated on the basis of soil type, rainfall and other climatic factors. The drought and hunger stalking the country has forced cabinet to form a committee to deal with the issue and food security at a national level. The looming food crisis has several causes. Besides drought, there is the issue of lack of productivity following the land reform programme and government policy failures in agriculture.
• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au): Food systems too reliant on petrol
  Economist and climate change author Jeremy Rifkin believes the world faces a major food crisis, because it is too dependent on fossil fuels.
• 2012/04/03: SciAm:EC: Bat-Killing Fungus Continues Deadly Spread; Death Toll Now at 7 Million
• 2012/04/04: Eureka: Is rainfall a greater threat to China's agriculture than warming?
• 2012/04/03: SeedDaily: China's grain at risk from climate change
• 2012/04/03: CNN: UNICEF aims to raise awareness of children at risk in Africa's Sahel region
  UNICEF estimates that about 1 million children could die of malnutrition - The children are in the Sahel region of Africa, which is prone to droughts - The UN agency has started a social media campaign to raise awareness - It so far only has about a quarter of the funds it has requested to tackle the crisis
• 2012/04/02: TreeHugger: Bengal, Assam Tea Production Slashed By Worst Drought in 15 Years
• 2012/04/02: DWR: The Coming Pancake Apocalypse - Damn You, Mild Winter!
• 2012/04/02: PostMedia: Maple syrup makers play wait-and-see
  Despite the arrival of summer-like temperatures in March, Quebec's maple syrup producers say it's still too early to predict whether production across the province will be up or down this year. While some producers in parts of Ontario and the U.S. are closing their taps and reporting yields of 20 per cent to 50 per cent less than normal, a spokesman for Quebec's maple syrup producers said sugar maples are still producing sap in more northern regions of the province.

The state of the world's fisheries is a concern:

• 2012/04/02: FuturePundit: Forage Fish Harvests Should Be Halved
• 2012/04/01: Eureka: Expert task force recommends halving global fishing for crucial prey species
• 2012/04/03: Guardian(UK): Will overfishing by foreigners drive Senegalese fishermen to piracy?
  The complaints made by Somali fishermen some years ago about illegal fishing are very similar to those being voiced by the fishermen of Senegal today
• 2012/04/02: OSU: Task force recommends reducing global harvest of "forage fish"
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): Is the EU taking its over-fishing habits to west African waters?
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: Righting International Fisheries Management: Sustaining The 'Wicked Tuna'

  Food Prices are still problematic:

• FAO: World Food Situation - Food Price Indices
• 2012/04/05: FAO: Food prices remain nearly unchanged in March -- Cereal supplies improve in spite of tight coarse grains
• 2012/04/05: UN: Food prices remain nearly unchanged in March, UN agency reports
• 2012/04/06: People's Daily: Sharp rise in prices of agricultural necessities

  Look out! the IP Rentiers are coming!

• 2012/04/05: SlashDot: The Supreme Court To Rule On Monsanto Seed Patents

  Regarding the genetic modification of food:

• 2012/04/05: TreeHugger: Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont Over GMO Labeling Law
• 2012/04/05: TreeHugger: How Much Do People Everywhere Hate Monsanto? New Report Shows Global Resistance
• 2012/04/06: TreeHugger: Poland to Ban Monsanto's Genetically Modified Corn
• 2012/04/05: EUO: Poland will impose a complete ban on the MON810 genetically-modified strain of maize made by US company Monsanto on its territory, farm minister Marek Sawicki said Wednesday
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont if Legislators Pass a Bill Requiring GMO Food to Be Labeled
• 2012/04/04: Grist: FDA to GMO labeling campaign: What millon signatures?
• 2012/04/01: NoC: Massive Public Protests Spur France to Ban Plantings of Monsanto's MON810 GMO Corn

  And how are we going to feed 9 billion, 10 billion, 15 billion?

• 2012/04/06: Slate: How To Feed the World After Climate Change
  Genetically modified seeds aren't enough. We have to change the entire agricultural system.
• 2012/04/05: Guardian(UK): Gardeners should end their love affair with peat
  Mining peat unlocks stored carbon into the atmosphere, and there are far better alternatives to help your garden grow
• 2012/04/05: Slate: What Cuba Can Teach Us About Food and Climate Change
  After the Cold War, Cuba faced many of the agricultural challenges that the rest of the world is now anticipating.
• 2012/04/03: Grist: Glean unto others: Ending hunger with foraged foods
• 2012/04/04: UCopenhagen: New forage plant prepares farmers for climate changes
• 2012/04/04: OnlineOpinion: Permaculture: a new dominant narrative?
• 2012/04/03: PlanetArk: Analysis: Young U.S. Farmers Coax Crops From Conservation Lands

  A relatively quiet week. Tropical Storm Daphne blew around the Western Pacific:

• 2012/04/03: Eureka: NASA infrared image sees a stronger Tropical Storm Daphne
• 2012/04/02: al Jazeera: Flood-ravaged Fiji braces for cyclone
  State of emergency in force as Cyclone Daphne threatens to compound damage in South Pacific nation hit by flash floods.

While elsewhere in the hurricane wars:

• 2012/04/04: SciAm: Below Average Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast
  The 2012 Atlantic hurricane season will be "below average" with 10 tropical storms, four of which will strengthen into hurricanes, Colorado State University forecasters predicted on Wednesday.
• 2012/04/05: PlanetArk: Below Average Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast
• 2012/04/05: Wunderground: CSU: expect a quiet 2012 Atlantic hurricane season; EF-3 tornado confirmed in Texas
• 2012/04/05: al Jazeera: Hurricane season is just around the corner
  Forecasters are predicting that the 2012 season could have less storms than average

As for GHGs:

• 2012/04/06: Nature:FtLB: Old News for Carbon Dioxide, New Threats for Climate Change
• 2012/03/16: CSIRO: Growing nitrous oxide levels explained

  And in the nitrogen cycle:

• 2012/04/02: EnergyBulletin: The nitrogen cycle and health

  As for the temperature record:

• 2012/04/05: Tamino: Decadal Trend in Temperature
• 2012/04/04: QuarkSoup: My UAH LT Prediction Was Quite Close
• 2012/04/03: BBC: March weather third warmest on record, says Met Office
  Last month was the third warmest March on record - outshone only by 1938 and 1957 - the Met Office has said. It had an average temperature of 7.7C, compared with March 1938, which had an average of 8C.
• 2012/04/01: Eureka: New comparison of ocean temperatures reveals rise over the last century
  Ocean robots used in Scripps-led study that traces ocean warming to late 19th century
• 2012/04/02: CSM: Global warming began in oceans 135 years ago, suggests study

  What's up with the Jet Streams?

• 2012/04/02: Wunderground: Arctic sea ice loss tied to unusual jet stream patterns

  Aerosols are making their presence felt:

• 2012/04/03: SEasterbrook: Aerosols: Are They Good or Bad?

  Clouds are one of the major uncertainties in climate. Much research revolves around them:

• 2012/04/02: ERW: Eurasian summer temperatures linked to cloud cover

  While in the paleoclimate:

• 2012/04/05: IODP: Ice sheet collapse and sea-level rise at the Bølling warming 14,600 years ago

  And on the ENSO front:

• 2012/04/05: NOAA:NCEP: El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion
  Synopsis: La Niña is expected to transition to ENSO-neutral conditions during April 2012.

Regarding the solar hypothesis:

• 2012/04/04: Stoat: Global temperature response to radiative forcing: Solar cycle versus volcanic eruptions

  Meanwhile in near earth orbit:

• 2012/04/04: ESA: ESA and NASA join forces to measure Arctic sea ice [Icebridge & CryoSat]

  More GW impacts are being seen:

• 2012/04/05: RT: Global warming affects Russia more than others - meteorologists
• 2012/04/06: Eureka: Long-term research reveals causes and consequences of environmental change -- New insights as the nation's leading ecological research network reflects on 3 decades of research
• 2012/04/06: Eureka: Long-term studies detect effects of disappearing snow and ice -- Research conducted over decades unravels complex ecosystem responses as icy regions shrink
• 2012/04/05: Eureka: Which plants will survive droughts, climate change?
  New research by UCLA life scientists could lead to predictions of which plant species will escape extinction from climate change. Droughts are worsening around the world, posing a great challenge to plants in all ecosystems, said Lawren Sack, a UCLA professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and senior author of the research.
• 2012/04/04: CBC: Canada's snow cover shrinking
  The area of Canada covered in snow at certain times of the year shrank by as much as a third between 1972 and 2010, Statistics Canada reports.
• 2012/04/02: QuarkSoup: When Should Activists Plan for 400 ppm?
• 2012/04/02: QuarkSoup: What We Might Soon See (at 400 ppm)
• 2012/03/31: IndiaTimes: How ecosystems will be affected by global warming
• 2012/03/30: KoreaTimes: Yellow dust storms from China spread faster

  And then there are the world's forests:

• 2012/04/06: Eureka: Scientists forecast forest carbon loss -- Findings underscore value of long-term ecological research as nation's network marks 30+ years

  Emerging diseases accompany ecological change:

• 2012/04/06: TP:JR: U.S. Rabies Outbreaks Linked To Drought, Warm Weather
• 2012/04/06: Grist: Climate change could give you rabies
• 2012/04/02: ProMedMail: Avian cholera - USA: (OR, CA)
• 2012/04/02: Eureka: Climate model to predict malaria outbreaks in India

  Yes we have no wacky weather, except:

• 2012/04/06: al Jazeera: Late season snow stuns the UK
  After a week of record breaking heat, the UK shifts gears back to winter-like conditions
• 2012/04/05: BBC: Buenos Aires hit by deadly storm
  At least 14 people have been killed in severe storms in Argentina.
• 2012/04/08: ABC(Au): Wild Sydney storms leave thousands without power
• 2012/04/05: BBC: Alma telescope in Chile battles extreme weather
  Thunderstorms, heavy rain, snow, floods and mudslides are not exactly what one would expect to see in the driest place on Earth, the Atacama Desert in Chile. But for the past two months, these were the working conditions of the team of scientists at one of the world's biggest astronomy projects, the Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (Alma).
• 2012/04/03: BBerg: Japan's Strongest Storm Since 1959 Slams Into Tokyo Region
• 2012/04/04: ABC(Au): Violent storm leaves four dead in Japan
• 2012/04/04: al Jazeera: Deadly storm lashes northern Japan
  Four people reported dead as strong winds and heavy rains batter the country, disrupting air and train transport.
• 2012/04/03: BBC: Gales cause North East power cuts
  Around 10,000 properties in the north east of England are without power because of problems caused by the wintry weather
.
• 2012/04/03: ABC(Au): Strong storm wreaks havoc in Japan

  This week in the New Normal -- extreme weather:

• 2012/04/05: EarlyWarning: Slowing Rossby Waves Leading to Extreme Weather?
• 2012/04/08: al Jazeera: Alaska's never-ending winter
  Record-breaking snowfall has made life difficult for the inhabitants of the 49th state
• 2012/04/05: TreeHugger: CNN Meteorologist Connects Extreme Weather to Climate Change (Video)
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: CNN Meteorologist: This 'Strange Spring' Where Extremes 'Become The Norm' Is The 'Climate Change We Are Seeing'
• 2012/04/04: TreeHugger: Extreme Weather USA: 2012 Kicks Off With Record Heat, Tornadoes & Drought
• 2012/04/02: al Jazeera: Scotland's early spring is coming to a halt
  Record breaking temperatures are ending as colder temperatures and snow showers are expected in the coming days
• 2012/04/01: CCP: Paul Douglas: 18,009 meteorological records broken in March 2012

  Changes in natural cycles are showing up:

• 2012/04/01: ClimateSight: March Migration Data

  On the tornado front:

• 2012/04/05: Eureka: NASA's TRMM Satellite sees tornadic Texas storms in 3-D
• 2012/04/03: USA Today: Tornado risk is growing and spreading, study shows
  It's not just the "Tornado Alley" any more. Tornadoes are striking in more parts of the U.S., more often, a new study shows. Experts are enlarging the area of the U.S. they believe is regularly in the path of severe storms, tornadoes, and hail damage, according to a report from CoreLogic.
• 2012/04/07: al Jazeera: Dallas airport battered and bruised
  Hail from severe thunderstorms leads to the cancellation of 1900 flights
• 2012/04/04: Eureka: GOES satellite movie tracked tornadic Texas trouble
• 2012/04/04: TreeHugger: Up to a Dozen Massive Tornadoes Rip Through Dallas (Video)
• 2012/04/04: CSM: Texas tornadoes: Why no fatalities after a dozen tornadoes? (+video)
• 2012/04/04: BBC: US tornado flings trucks through the air [video]
• 2012/04/04: CBC: Dallas-area residents survey tornado damage -- No reported deaths in Texas storms, but several people injured
• 2012/04/04: al Jazeera: Powerful tornadoes pummel Texas
  Widespread damage and air travel disrupted as a dozen twisters wreak havoc in Dallas-Forth Worth area.
• 2012/04/03: Wunderground: Tornadoes rip through Dallas metro area
• 2012/04/03: CBC: Texas tornadoes cause damage, injuries
  Early estimates suggest between 6 and 12 tornadoes touched down in north Texas
• 2012/04/04: ABC(Au): Trucks hurled through air as tornadoes hit Dallas
• 2012/04/03: Guardian(UK): Tornadoes touch down in Dallas area causing 'considerable damage'
  Large tornadoes reported just south of Dallas, but no injuries reported from twisters that ripped through neighbourhoods
• 2012/04/03: BBC: Tornadoes wreck homes and ground flights in Texas
  Tornadoes have touched down near Dallas, Texas, flipping trucks, uprooting trees, wrecking homes and grounding planes.
• 2012/04/03: BBC: In pictures: Texas tornadoes

  Corals are a bellwether of the ocean's health:

• 2012/04/04: SciAm:GB: Coral Transplants Offer Hope to Threatened Reefs
• 2012/04/02: CoralCOE: Corals 'could survive a more acidic ocean'

  Glaciers are melting:

• 2012/04/05: TP:JR: Five Iconic Mountains Threatened By Climate Change
• 2012/04/02: NatureN: Glaciologists to target third pole -- High-tech stations on track to monitor third-largest ice store.
  The fate of many glaciers in Tibet and its surrounding mountain ranges remains controversial. With the health of the world's highest glaciers in dispute, an international team is planning a long-term campaign to measure the vital signs of the ice atop Tibet and its surrounding mountains.

Sea levels are rising:

• 2012/04/02: HotTopic: Ignoring the future? Sea level rise and NZ's planning guidelines

  As for hydrological cycle disruptions [floods & droughts]:

• 2012/04/06: OSU: Study: Impact of warming climate doesn't always translate to streamflow
• 2012/04/05: BBC: Hosepipe bans enforced in drought areas
  Hosepipe bans affecting about 20 million customers have been introduced by seven water authorities in parts of southern and eastern England.
• 2012/04/04: ABC(Au): Fijian army helping with flood clean-up
• 2012/04/04: ABC(Au): Catastrophic damage in flood-stricken Fiji [pix]
• 2012/04/03: CNN: 5 dead, thousands displaced in Fiji floods
  The flooding has left 5 people dead and 8,000 in temporary shelters - Tropical Cyclone Daphne is expected to pass to the south of Fiji - The storm has deluged Fiji's biggest island with rain - Travel in and out of the international airport has been disrupted
• 2012/04/03: al Jazeera: Fiji's massive clean-up begins -- Deadly flooding is slowly subsiding, but new dangers are expected
  The nation of Fiji is beginning its massive clean-up operation in the wake of deadly flooding that has ravaged the island. In the first days of April, Fiji has recorded over 223mm of rain. Normally it sees only 163mm for the entire month.
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Three dead, thousands evacuated in Fiji flooding
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Fiji declares emergency as four dead
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Flood-damaged Fiji likened to warzone
  People in flood-ravaged Fiji have begun returning home after spending several days in evacuation centres. The death toll from the floods has risen to five after some of the worst flooding the country has seen in decades. Officials in Fiji say locals are likely to be spared a further heavy downpour, with Cyclone Daphne, which formed on Monday afternoon, expected to pass by the island.
• 2012/04/02: al Jazeera: Flood-ravaged Fiji braces for cyclone
  State of emergency in force as Cyclone Daphne threatens to compound damage in South Pacific nation hit by flash floods.

First, stop subsidizing fossil fuels
Second, put a price on carbon
And elsewhere on the mitigation front:

• 2012/04/05: MoJo: Stopping Climate Change is Much Cheaper Than You Think
  A UK report confirms the cost of preventing climate change would cost the average citizen just pennies a day.
• 2012/04/02: Grist: Only system-wide change can cure our climate hangover

  Consider transportation & GHG production:

• 2012/04/05: Guardian(UK): Government urged to include aviation and shipping in UK carbon targets
• 2012/04/06: FDL: Young People Are Driving Significantly Less
• 2012/04/05: USPIRG: Report: Transportation and the New Generation
• 2012/04/03: IBA: Gov. Brown looks to global warming fees to pay for high-speed rail
• 2012/04/02: AlterNet: How Train Travel Could Make a Comeback

  While in the endless quest for zero energy, sustainable buildings and practical codes:

• 2012/04/02: TreeHugger: Five Things you Should Know Before you Start your Next LEED Project

  As for carbon sequestration:

• 2012/04/06: GreenGrok: Carbon Capture and Storage: A Fresh Look at Storage and Other Issues
• 2012/04/03: Guardian(UK): New push for carbon capture and storage with £1bn competition
• 2012/04/03: Guardian(UK): Is the UK right to invest in carbon capture technology?
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): New plans for carbon capture must not repeat mistakes of the past
  If CCS is to have a second chance, we need an active industrial strategy, underpinned by smart regulation and credible finance

While on the adaptation front:

• 2012/04/04: CSM: A growing answer to rising seas: floating homes

  Meanwhile in the journals:

• 2012/04/04: ESDD: Mathematical modelling of positive carbon-climate feedback: permafrost lake methane emission case by I. A. Sudakov & S. A. Vakulenko
• 2012/04/02: ESDD: Regional feedbacks under changing climate and land-use conditions by L. Batlle Bayer et al.
• 2012/04/04: CP: Interpreting last glacial to Holocene dust changes at Talos Dome (East Antarctica): implications for atmospheric variations from regional to hemispheric scales by S. Albani et al.
• 2012/04/03: CP: Monsoonal response to mid-holocene orbital forcing in a high resolution GCM by J. H. C. Bosmans et al.
• 2012/04/02: CP: Assessing extreme droughts in Spain during 1750-850 from rogation ceremonies by F. DomÃnguez-Castro et al.
• 2012/04/05: CPD: Increasing cloud cover in the 20th century: review and new findings in Spain by A. Sanchez-Lorenzo et al.
• 2012/04/03: CPD: On the gas-ice depth difference (?depth) along the EPICA Dome C ice core by F. Parrenin et al.
• 2012/04/02: CPD: Can we predict the duration of an interglacial? by P. C. Tzedakis et al.
• 2012/04/04: NERC:NORA: Rapid, large-scale temperature changes in the polar mesosphere and their relationship to meridional flows by P.J. Espy et al.
• 2012/04/04: NERC:NORA: Supraglacial debris along the front of the Larsen-A Ice Shelf, Antarctic Peninsula by Jeffrey Evans et al.
• 2012/04/05: TCD: Uncertainties in the global temperature change caused by carbon release from permafrost thawing by E. J. Burke et al.
• 2012/04/07: AGWObserver: Papers on regional and local land temperature reconstructions
• 2012/04/04: Nature: (ab$) Aerosols implicated as a prime driver of twentieth-century North Atlantic climate variability by Ben B. B. Booth et al.
• 2012/04/05: ACP: Observed temporal evolution of global mean age of stratospheric air for the 2002 to 2010 period by G. P. Stiller et al.
• 2012/04/04: ACP: Tight coupling of particle size, number and composition in atmospheric cloud droplet activation by D. O. Topping & G. McFiggans
• 2012/04/03: ACP: Detection of particle layers in backscatter profiles: application to Antarctic lidar measurements by J. Gazeaux et al.
• 2012/04/03: ACP: One decade of parallel fine (PM2.5) and coarse (PM10-PM2.5) particulate matter measurements in Europe: trends and variability by I. Barmpadimos et al.
• 2012/04/03: ACP: Signature of the 27-day solar rotation cycle in mesospheric OH and H2O observed by the Aura Microwave Limb Sounder by A. V. Shapiro et al.
• 2012/04/05: ACPD: Investigation of source attributions of pollution to the Western Arctic during the NASA ARCTAS field campaign by H. Bian et al.
• 2012/04/05: ACPD: Response of fine particulate matter concentrations to changes of emissions and temperature in Europe by A. G. Megaritis et al.
• 2012/04/05: ACPD: Effects of business-as-usual anthropogenic emissions on air quality by A. Pozzer et al.
• 2012/04/05: arXiv: Public Perception of Climate Change and the New Climate Dice by James Hansen et al.
• 2012/03/28: Nature: (ab$) Ice-sheet collapse and sea-level rise at the Bølling warming 14,600 years ago by Pierre Deschamps et al.
• 2012/04/04: Nature: (ab$) Past extreme warming events linked to massive carbon release from thawing permafrost by Robert M. DeConto et al.
• 2012/04/04: Nature: (ab$) Global warming preceded by increasing carbon dioxide concentrations during the last deglaciation by Jeremy D. Shakun et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (ab$) Vertebrate time-tree elucidates the biogeographic pattern of a major biotic change around the K/T boundary in Madagascar by Angelica Crottini et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (ab$) Spatial and temporal arrival patterns of Madagascar's vertebrate fauna explained by distance, ocean currents, and ancestor type by Karen E. Samonds et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (abs) Comanagement of coral reef social-ecological systems by Joshua E. Cinner et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (ab$) Lifetime of carbon capture and storage as a climate-change mitigation technology by Michael L. Szulczewski et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (abs) Mechanism for Burgess Shale-type preservation by Robert R. Gaines et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (ab$) Finessing the fracture energy barrier in ballistic seed dispersal by Robert D. Deegan
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (ab$) Mesoamerican origin of the common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) is revealed by sequence data by Elena Bitocchi et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (abs) Origin of first cells at terrestrial, anoxic geothermal fields by Armen Y. Mulkidjanian et al.
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (ab$) Mapping patterns of long-term settlement in Northern Mesopotamia at a large scale by Bjoern H. Menze & Jason A. Ur
• 2012/04/03: PNAS: (letter$) A perfect (geochemical) storm yielded exceptional fossils in the early ocean by Timothy W. Lyons
• 2012/04/04: Nature: (ab$) Aerosols implicated as a prime driver of twentieth-century North Atlantic climate variability by Ben B. B. Booth et al.
• 2012/04/03: GMD: "Gtool5": a Fortran90 library of input/output interfaces for self-descriptive multi-dimensional numerical data by M. Ishiwatari et al.
• 2012/04/03: OS: Arctic Ocean circulation and variability - advection and external forcing encounter constraints and local processes by B. Rudels
• 2012/04/03: TC: Brief communication "Importance of slope-induced error correction in volume change estimates from radar altimetry" by R. T. W. L. Hurkmans et al.
• 2012/04/03: TC: Melt ponds on Arctic sea ice determined from MODIS satellite data using an artificial neural network by A. Rösel et al.
• 2012/04/02: TC: Multi-scale validation of a new soil freezing scheme for a land-surface model with physically-based hydrology by I. Gouttevin et al.
• 2012/04/01: Nature:CC: (ab$) 135 years of global ocean warming between the Challenger expedition and the Argo Programme by Dean Roemmich et al.
• 2012/04/02: AGWObserver: New research from last week 13/2012

  As for miscellaneous science:

• 2012/04/07: UNDispatch: Using Oral History to Track Climate Change in the American West
• 2012/04/06: SoS: James Randi on Magicians and the Security Mindset - how a magician's inherent ability to detect deception can be useful to science
• 2012/04/04: NatureNB: Scientists see funding slashed in Spanish budget
• 2012/04/03: ScienceInsider: Bigger-Than-Expected Budget Cuts Hit Spanish Scientists
• 2012/04/02: Stoat: I am a red hot climate change denialist?
• 2012/04/02: RealClimate: Evaluating a 1981 temperature projection

  What's new in models?

• 2012/04/02: EarthMag: Foretelling next month's tornadoes

  What developments in the ongoing struggle for Free Science?

• 2012/04/01: Heiko: What I hate about Elsevier, a short summary

  Regarding Hansen:

• 2012/04/06: Guardian(UK): NASA scientist: climate change is a moral issue on a par with slavery
  Prof Jim Hansen to use lecture at Edinburgh International Science Festival to call for worldwide tax on all carbon emissions
• 2012/04/07: HotTopic: Hansen's letter on lignite
• 2012/04/07: PSinclair: Hansen: Climate Change a Moral Issue on a Par with Slavery
• 2012/04/07: P3: Extraordinary Hansen et al Paper

  Regarding Mann:

• 2012/04/01: ClimateShifts: Climate scientists and smear campaigns

  The Pielke fan clubbe, alas:

• 2012/04/04: ERabett: A Visit to the Whine and Fang

  Regarding Curry:

• 2012/04/05: CQ: A truly catastrophic change
• 2012/04/03: ERabett: In which Judith Curry seeks help with the rent ...the US falling behind in numerical weather forecasting...
• 2012/04/02: DeSmogBlog: Judith Curry Was For Me Before She Was Against Me

  While at the UN:

• 2012/04/03: NatureNB: United Nations to appoint a chief scientific advisor
• 2012/04/02: UN: Ban: new economic paradigm needed, including social and environmental progress
• 2012/04/02: UN: At UN conference, Latin American countries reaffirm commitment to eradicate hunger

  And on the carbon trading front:

• 2012/04/03: EurActiv: EU emissions drop triggers carbon price freefall
  Sagging carbon prices lost nearly 14% of their value yesterday (2 April) as recession and a warm winter sparked a predicted 2.6% drop in carbon emissions from the 10,000 installations covered by the EU's Emissions Trading System (ETS) last year. According to preliminary 'like-for-like' data released by the EU on 2 April, emissions covered by the ETS were 1.88 billion tones in 2011, a slight fall on the 2010 figure of 1.94 billion tones. But those numbers were also 114 Million tonnes below the EU's ETS cap, indicating that the market was over-supplied with carbon allowances for the third year in a row, and for the sixth in seven years. The already-depressed carbon price dived from E7 to a record low of E6.14 by early afternoon on the news of yet more spare capacity on the market, before recovering.
• 2012/04/03: EUO: Carbon prices fall to record low

  On the international political front, tensions continue as the USA and Israel lean on Iran:

• 2012/04/04: EconBrowser: Replacing Iran's oil production
• 2012/04/05: al Jazeera: Chinese insurer stops covering Iranian oil
  Company's decision, coupled with US and EU sanctions, will make it more difficult for refiners to import oil from Iran.
• 2012/04/02: JapanTimes: India and the Iran sanctions

  As the EU-ETS is applied to airlines, we will see who is serious about reducing carbon emissions:

• 2012/04/06: EUO: EU aviation-CO2 tax to cost 'less than a cup of coffee'
• 2012/04/04: Guardian(UK): 'Polluter pays' is the only principle that can limit aviation emissions by Connie Hedegaard
  We cannot accept threats of all kinds of trouble just because a small price has to be paid for the pollution caused by travel

While in the solar panel trade war between China and the USA:

• 2012/04/06: Grist: Solar 'scandal' upshot: China is dominating global solar market, for better or worse

  The fight over South Atlantic sea floor oil fields is building:

• 2012/04/04: BBC: HMS Dauntless sets sail for the Falklands
  HMS Dauntless, one of the UK's largest and most powerful air defence destroyers, has set sail for the Falkland Islands. The Ministry of Defence says it is a "pre-planned and routine" six-month deployment in the South Atlantic. However, it comes days after the 30th anniversary of the start of the war.

Climate Change is a threat multiplier exacerbating existing conflicts in food, energy, water, race, ideology ... etc.:

• 2012/04/02: SciAm: A Tour of the New Geopolitics of Global Warming
  Climate change is already shaping conflicts around the world--and not for the better
• 2012/04/02: CCP: National security implications of climate change -- military analyses

  What are the activists up to?

• 2012/04/05: AlterNet: Why Do We Pay Energy Giants to Wreck Earth? [McKibben]
• 2012/04/04: SMandia: Support Climate Scientists & Look Cool Doing So!
• 2012/04/04: CCP: Get Your Own Climate Hockey Stick ...

  Regarding Water Politics and Business:

• 2012/04/06: JFleck: Stuff I wrote elsewhere: lousy runoff on the Rio Grande
• 2012/04/06: AlterNet: Debating the Future of Our World's Water
• 2012/04/07: JFleck: Did I miss the peak?
• 2012/04/03: JFleck: New Mexico rural-urban groundwater project denied
• 2012/04/03: TreeHugger: EPA Orders Oil Companies to Pay for Contamination of Montana Town's Water Supply
• 2012/04/02: Grist: Incredible NASA images of Saudi Arabia's careless use of water
• 2012/03/29: NASA: NASA Sees Fields of Green Spring up in Saudi Arabia
  Saudi Arabia is drilling for a resource possibly more precious than oil

As for SW tools:

• 2012/04/05: TreeHugger: Visualize Climate Change Data with Free iPhone App from NASA

  And on the American political front:

• 2012/04/05: HoustonChronicle: Report finds Texas lags in preparing for climate change
• 2012/04/05: TreeHugger: Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont Over GMO Labeling Law
• 2012/04/05: GoErie: States' readiness ranked in face of water threats
• 2012/04/06: al Jazeera: GOP: Check your intelligence
  Republican leaders and talk-show hosts have made it their mission to mock anyone of serious intellectual import.
• 2012/04/05: TP:JR: U.S. Global Warming Denial Will Help China Overtake America, Experts Warn
• 2012/04/05: Wonkette: Arizona Senate: 'Energy Efficiency' Is UN Plot For One-World-Order
• 2012/04/07: PSinclair: ConservAmerica Mad at Maddow
• 2012/04/05: Grist: Michigan threatens small farms by calling heritage pigs 'invasive'
• 2012/04/05: KPLU: Climate change could cost Washington [state] $10 billion a year; state crafting response
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: Deciphering Right-Wing Code: What Conservatives Are Really Saying When They Seem to Spew Nonsense [2012]
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont if Legislators Pass a Bill Requiring GMO Food to Be Labeled
• 2012/04/04: EnvEcon: Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end
• 2012/04/03: TP:JR: California's Next Step In Energy Efficiency Legislation: Building Retrofits
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: Tea Party Introduces 'Wacky' And 'Ludicrous' Conspiracy Bill To Shut Down Arizona Energy Efficiency Programs
• 2012/04/03: Grist: Of soccer moms and sinister U.N. plots
• 2012/04/03: IBA: Gov. Brown looks to global warming fees to pay for high-speed rail
• 2012/03/18: CMass: The U.S. Has Fallen Behind in Numerical Weather Prediction: Part I
• 2012/04/04: PSinclair: Cap and Trade. One Great Republican Idea
• 2012/04/03: Guardian(UK): Rick Perry criticises UK initiative to influence US climate sceptics
• 2012/04/03: Grist: Anti-coal campaign is 'the most significant achievement of American environmentalists' since the 1970s
• 2012/04/02: NBF: Revised California High Speed rail budget at $68.4 billion
• 2012/04/03: PSinclair: Republicans for Environmental Protection Throw in the Towel on "Republican" [ and become ConservAmerica]
• 2012/04/02: MPR: A Republican meteorologist looks at climate change
• 2012/04/02: CCP: Global warming denial in U.S. will help China overtake America, says top scientist, Peter Raven
• 2012/04/02: KSJT: LA Times, NPR, etc: So, did we know it all along? Sociologist reports many US rightwingers feel science is liberal social construct
• 2012/04/02: FTAlphaville: What's keeping US gas prices aloft
• 2012/04/02: Grist: If fossil fuel subsidies were distributed to every person, we'd each get $58/year
• 2012/04/02: OPB: On The Ground In Grays Harbor: What's The Word On That New Export Terminal?
  In the past few weeks, EarthFix has begun a regional project to document -- using photos, video, mapping and audio -- what exporting American coal to China could mean for the people in the Northwest.
• 2012/04/02: MoJo: How a Grassroots Rebellion Won the Nation's Biggest Climate Victory
  Activists have imposed a de facto moratorium on new coal -- and beat the Obama EPA to the punch.
• 2012/03/29: AlterNet: Forget the Farm Bill: Where We Should Set Our Sights This Year For Real Change

  The BP disaster continues to twist US politics:

• 2012/04/05: ERW: Gulf's dolphins pay heavy price for Deepwater oil spill
  A new study of dolphins living close to the site of North America's worst ever oil spill -- the BP Deepwater Horizon catastrophe two years ago -- has established serious health problems afflicting the marine mammals.
• 2012/03/29: ISS: Mississippi residents find death along oily Gulf shores
• 2012/04/03: Discovery: Thousands of Dolphins Dying in Gulf Waters
• 2012/04/02: OilDrum: From SEMP to SEMS: Industry's Response to the Deepwater Horizon / Macondo disaster
• 2012/04/01: CCP: No Sign of Oyster Recovery Two Years After BP Oil Spill

  On the 2012 campaign trail:

• 2012/04/06: Grist: Being Green: Presidential hopeful Jill Stein aims to rebuild a broken system
• 2012/04/06: TreeHugger: Mitt Romney: Climate Flip-flopper and Fracking Defender
• 2012/04/05: Wonkette: Magic Wizard Newt Gingrich Causes Everything He Touches To Go Bankrupt
• 2012/04/05: OilChange: Obama Says Romney is "Candidate of Big Oil"
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: Did the Koch Machine Put Romney Over the Top in Wisconsin?
• 2012/04/04: al Jazeera: Romney sweeps US Republican primaries
  US presidential hopeful picks up three more wins to extend lead over Rick Santorum in race for Republican nomination.
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: Romney On Cap And Trade In 2003: 'I Am Making Good On My Pledge' To Clean Up Carbon Pollution 'Harming Our Climate'
• 2012/04/02: TAW: What the Guys Who Want to be President Want to Do on the Environment
• 2012/03/21 BoingBoing: Don't let Mitt Romney's anti-gay billionaire backer [Frank VanderSloot] whitewash his intimidation of critics

  The Keystone XL saga rolls along:

• 2012/04/05: TheHill:e2W: On the stump, Senate Dem candidates split with Obama over Keystone pipeline
• 2012/04/04: OilChange: Keystone refineries on export overdrive
• 2012/04/03: Guardian(UK): Bill McKibben on Keystone XL and the power of fossil fuel industry

  The GOP is continuing their War On Women:

• 2012/04/06: Wonkette: Alaska GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski Keeps Not Getting Memo On War On Women
• 2012/04/07: al Jazeera: Libertarians get medieval on women
  Debates on birth control in the US show how modern conservatism is just a neoliberal gloss on medieval domination.
• 2012/04/04: RawStory: Arizona bill would declare pregnancy 2 weeks before conception
• 2012/04/03: RawStory: Nikki Haley: 'Women don't care about contraception'
  Republican South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley on Tuesday said that the Obama administration had made a mistake by mandating that health insurance cover birth control because "women don't care about contraception."
• 2012/04/04: CCP: Climate Denial bubbles work over time as gumbies in an Orwellian Newspeak attack on sociology professor Kari Norgaard
• 2012/04/04: CCP: Rush Limbaugh keeps attacking women, now it is University of Oregon sociology professor Kari Norgaard's turn for writing about climate change deniers
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: The Root of the Conservative War on Contraception Comes From a Deep-seated Anxiety

  Remember Charles Monnett? That BOEM travesty contiues:

• 2012/04/07: CCP: BOEM Inspector General's Office wastes millions of tax payer dollars in witch hunt instigated by Sen. Inhoax Inhofe against Arctic researcher, Charles Monnett...

  The Obama chatter is nonstop:

• 2012/04/02: SST: "Zubrin: Obama shoots down Mars exploration"

  The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:

• 2012/04/05: TheHill:e2W: Energy Department prepares to approve more green loans
• 2012/04/06: TreeHugger: DOE Dangles $100K For Home Energy Data Apps
• 2012/04/05: STimes: Drilling fees pay for new national forest lands
  Offshore drilling fees are financing the purchase of $41.6 million worth of new national forest lands in 15 states.
• 2012/04/03: GreenGrok: Nuclear Power: Our Government's Got the Industry's Back
• 2012/04/05: FDL: USDA Seeks to Let Poultry Companies Self-Inspect Their Product
• 2012/04/04: Grist: FDA to GMO labeling campaign: What millon signatures?
• 2012/04/03: TheHill:e2W: Interior to expedite review of onshore oil drilling permits
• 2012/04/04: NatureN: US integrity effort hits troubled water
  Allegations by integrity officer who lost his job are a setback for plan to quash political inference in science.
• 2012/04/03: TreeHugger: With New System, Obama Admin to Approve Fracking & Drilling Operations in 1/3rd the Time
• 2012/04/02: SciAm: U.S. Approves 20 Firms to Make Higher-Blend E15 Biofuel
• 2012/04/03: TreeHugger: EPA Orders Oil Companies to Pay for Contamination of Montana Town's Water Supply

  As for what is going on in Congress:

• 2012/04/05: CCP: Climate criminal Sen. James InHoax Inhofe's tax-money-wasting investigation (witch hunt) into polar bear study by Charles Monnett continues...
• 2012/04/06: TP:JR: Lawmakers Across the Political Spectrum Speak Up: We Want The Wind Tax Credit Extended
• 2012/04/06: Grist: Congressman [Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa)] brags about forcing vegetarians to 'confess'
• 2012/04/06: WaPo: Petroleum institute's numbers on oil policy a matter of dispute
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: HEAT Stroke: House Energy Action Plan Reads Like A Bad April Fools Joke
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: Solar Policy Can Advance (Or Delay) Grid Parity By A Decade

  While in the UK:

• 2012/04/06: EurActiv: Britain opens £20 mln wave power contest
  Britain launched on Thursday a £20 million (E24 million) contest to support up to two pilot wave energy projects, as the government hopes to scale up the clean technology to power more homes and businesses and curb carbon emissions. Marine power has the potential to provide up to 20% of current electricity demand in the United Kingdom, as well as help the country reach its climate targets and support thousands of jobs, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said.
• 2012/04/06: Guardian(UK): [Letters] Fallacy of the case for a third runway
• 2012/04/05: Guardian(UK): Government urged to include aviation and shipping in UK carbon targets
• 2012/04/04: Guardian(UK): David Cameron to make keynote environment speech
  Prime minister will address G20 ministers on 26 April, in what will be his first major speech on green issues since taking office
• 2012/04/02: BBC: New UK attempt to capture carbon
  A renewed attempt to develop ways of making power stations greener is set to be unveiled by the government. For the second time in five years, £1 billion will be offered for schemes to trap and bury carbon dioxide. An earlier competition collapsed after all nine entrants pulled out, most citing cost as the main problem.
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): Nuclear industry dreams dashed by current economic reality
  It was the financing model and rates of return that prompted German nuclear giants RWC and E.ON to pull out of UK energy plans

And in Europe:

• 2012/04/05: EurActiv: Member states further weaken EU energy efficiency bill
  EU member states want fewer public buildings to be renovated and more flexibility in calculating annual energy savings from big retail companies. The Danish presidency received its much-awaited mandate to start negotiations with the European Parliament on the draft energy efficiency directive on 3 April, after a "tough" discussion between member state representatives. However, the Danes were left with a mandate described as "weak" and "vague" by activists after yesterday's meeting.
• 2012/04/03: AutoBG: Volvo CEO challenges EU, says it's "far too early" to dismiss fossil fuels
• 2012/04/05: PlanetArk: Austria To Spend 160 Million Euros To Close Kyoto Gap
• 2012/04/03: DerSpiegel: Mother Earth and the Fatherland -- Germany's Far-Right Turns to Environmentalism
  Environmentalists are often associated with the political left. But now neo-Nazis have discovered nature's charms too. In addition to selling organic vegetables and publishing a magazine on the environment, Germany's far-right NPD party has co-opted green campaign issues. Party members use it as a dubious means to make the NPD more socially acceptable.
• 2012/04/03: EUO: EU energy saving plans seen as too weak
  The latest draft of EU plans to get itself on track for a target of 20% energy savings by 2020 is seen as too weak by Green NGOs...
• 2012/04/03: PlanetArk: EU Energy Savings Plan Too Weak: Green Campaigners
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): EU carbon target threatened by biomass 'insanity'
• 2012/04/02: EurActiv: Biomass 'insanity' may threaten EU carbon targets
  The EU's emissions reduction target for 2020 could be facing an unlikely but grave obstacle, according to a growing number of scientists, EU officials and NGOs: the contribution of biomass to the EU's renewable energy objectives for 2020. On 29 March, a call was launched at the European Parliament for Brussels to reconsider its carbon accounting rules for biomass emissions, and EurActiv has learned that the issue is provoking widespread alarm in policy-making circles. "We're paying people to cut their forests down in the name of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and yet we are actually increasing them. No-one is apparently bothering to do any analysis about this," one Brussels insider told EurActiv. "They're just sleepwalking into this insanity," he added.
• 2012/03/29: BWeek: Germany Cuts Solar Aid to Curb Prices, Panel Installations
• 2012/04/02: PlanetArk: EU Fails To Resolve Dispute Over UN Climate Fund Seats

  Meanwhile in Australia:

• 2012/04/08: ABC(Au): Rising power prices prompt calls for overhaul
  There are increasing calls to overhaul Australia's electricity sector as electricity prices skyrocket and governments try to reduce carbon emissions. A massive $45 billion over five years is being spent to upgrade and maintain the network, and that cost is being passed onto the consumer. Because it is based on burning coal, the electricity network is Australia's biggest polluter, producing one third of national carbon emissions.
• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au): NSW greenhouse gas scheme scrapped
  The New South Wales Government has announced it will close its Greenhouse Gas Reduction Scheme when the federal carbon tax comes into force in July. The state's emissions trading scheme was one of the first in the world when it began operating in 2003.
• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au): [WA] Premier [Colin Barnett] rules out scrapping regional power subsidy
• 2012/04/03: PlanetJ: Labor should ignore business lobby's whining
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Dumped minister says PM must switch game plan
  A former Labor cabinet minister has given a scathing assessment of the Federal Government, saying it will lose the next election if it continues with the "game as usual". A month after the Prime Minister dumped him from the ministry, former emergency management minister Robert McClelland says Julia Gillard's broken promise over the carbon tax has affected her legitimacy with the electorate and that it is an issue that needs to be resolved. He says the Government will not be competitive in the federal election due next year if it does not address its weaknesses.

The Murray-Darling Basin Plan controversy continues:

• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au): Water groups unite to bring water back to wetland
  Nothing divides a community quite like water. And throughout the Murray-Darling Basin plan debate, it's often been irrigators versus the environmentalists. But recently on the banks of the Gol Gol creek just over the border from Mildura, all groups stood together and opened a new regulator that will allow water back into a wetland that for years had missed out, even in times of flood. The Gol Gol Lake is a 494-hectare wetland, home to river red gums, black box and migratory birds, and with Aboriginal cultural heritage significance.
• 2012/04/04: ABC(Au): Report puts value on Murray-Darling draft
  A long-awaited CSIRO report has found the proposed Murray-Darling Basin plan would provide between $3 billion and $8 billion worth of environmental benefits. The process to set up a Murray-Darling Basin plan was hatched at the height of a record-breaking drought, and is drawing to a conclusion as the river system is full to overflowing. Farmers throughout the basin may now be complaining about too much water, but the CSIRO has found that over time, the river systems will benefit from additional flows. But the 230-page study, released late on Wednesday afternoon, admits the plan will not fix all the basin's environmental problems. In particular, it finds that the proposal to recover just under 2,800 gigalitres a year is unlikely to affect the higher elevations of the Murray floodplains, and some river red gum and black box communities will continue to be compromised. The report is a vital source of information which has been put into the public sphere as the basin authority's 20-week consultation period draws to a close.
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Proposed Murray-Darling Basin plan draws fire from all sides
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): No need for desalination water this year
  The [Victoria] State Government has decided not to use water from the Wonthaggi desalination plant in its first year of operation. Water Minister Peter Walsh says rising dam levels mean the purchase of water could risk spillages from the Yarra storages.
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Aboriginal input urged for draft basin plan
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Goyder review rejects Murray water plan: SA Premier
  The South Australian Government says a review of the Murray-Darling Basin draft water plan has found it would be inadequate to sustain the environment. The review was done by the Goyder Institute for Water Research. SA Premier Jay Weatherill said it showed the draft plan was not even a good starting point to secure the basin's future.

And in New Zealand:

• 2012/04/04: BBerg: Maori Battle Goldman by Mount Doom in New Zealand Asset Sale

  While in the Indian subcontinent:

• 2012/04/02: CCurrents: India's Dangerous Nuclear Romance

  And elsewhere in Asia:

• 2012/04/07: al Jazeera: Energy ambitions fuel Central Asian rivalry
  Construction on new hydroelectric dam stirs Tajik-Uzbek tensions in dispute over shared natural resources.

And South America:

• 2012/04/04: BBC: Chile court rules in favour of Patagonia HidroAysen dam
  Chile's Supreme Court has ruled in favour of a multi-billion dollar dam project in Patagonia, in the south of the country. The court, the highest in the land, rejected an appeal by environmentalist groups who fear it will damage Patagonia's fragile ecosystem. The project, which involves flooding 6,000 hectares (15,000 acres) of land, still needs government approval.

In Canada, neocon PM Harper pushes petroleum while doing nothing about climate change:

• 2012/04/02: TStar: Canada will send oil to Asia even if Keystone XL pipeline proceeds, Harper says
• 2012/04/03: TP:JR: Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper Ignores Concerns About Tar Sands Pollution
• 2012/04/02: NewScientist: How Canada's green credentials fell apart
  Canada once enjoyed a deserved reputation for scientific and environmental leadership, but those days are now long gone
• 2012/04/03: LFR: Harper selling out Canada to China
• 2012/04/02: PostMedia: Energy industry fought Ottawa over greenhouse gas regulations: documents
  Petroleum producers weren't happy with Ottawa's plans last year for regulating greenhouse gases from the oil and gas sector and may have delayed the new rules from being introduced, federal documents reveal. Correspondence obtained under access to information shows the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers and the Conservative government were sparring in mid-2011 over what CAPP said were "serious deficiencies" in Ottawa's apparent plans to release - by last June - broad outlines for adopting new GHG regulations for the upstream oil and gas industry, including the carbon-intensive oilsands sector. Ten months later, the long-awaited proposed regulations still haven't been released.

The G20 controversy lingers:

• 2012/04/04: CBC: Bomb unit seizes material at G20 activist's former home -- 'Dangerous' container found at Forest Hill house where Byron Sonne lived

  The budget has come in for more analysis:

• 2012/04/07: TheCanadian: Budget 2012: At Least the War on the Environment is Going Well
• 2012/04/05: PostMedia: Harper government drops green pretences with majority budget
  Conservatives have identified their constituency and it does not include the Greenpeace brigade or supporters of the Council of Canadians Measures announced in last week's budget suggest the Harper government has decided to drop any and all pretence of being green. The document's lack of environmental conscience has Green party leader Elizabeth May seeing red. The MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands declares on her party's website that the budget is "the worst in the history of Canada. "This is devastating," May stated. "This is a war on the environment. It cannot go unchallenged."

The Harper gang is streamlining environmental reviews out of existence:

• 2012/04/04: PI: Faulty premise underlies Budget 2012 "streamlining" of environmental review process
• 2012/04/05: EmbassyMag: Environment advisory board death may lead to echo chamber: Former climate research head
  Feds say other services, think tanks, universities provide same expertise. The Harper government's decision to kill its own environmental advisory board could result in a government hearing little else but its own voice on climate change, says a former director of Environment Canada's meterological and climate research branch. The Conservatives' March 29 budget noted that it would introduce a bill to kill the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy.
• 2012/04/02: NorRe: Harrper's War On The Environment
• 2012/04/02: HillTimes: Feds want to silence environmental 'radicals' in budget cuts, say critics
  Liberal House leader Marc Garneau calls elimination of NRTEE 'disturbing.'
• 2012/04/02: iPolitics: Independent analysis further eroded with closing of NRTEE
• 2012/04/01: BCLSB: Tides Canada Responds To Attempted Federal Kneecapping

  Kent blames the journalists to wide disbelief:

• 2012/04/05: EmbassyMag: Science writers 'shocked' at Kent's response to muzzling claims
  They cite his journalistic past in questioning why he's not sympathetic to their cause. Journalist and public service representatives say they are "shocked" that despite Environment Minister Peter Kent's journalistic background, he has said complaints about the "muzzling" of government scientists are driven by impatient reporters.
• 2012/04/08: TStar: Prime Minister Harper muzzles diplomats and foreign agencies

  The battle over the Northern Gateway pipeline rages on:

• 2012/04/04: TheCanadian: Vancouver Says No to Enbridge, Kinder Morgan Pipelines, Tankers (video)
• 2012/04/05: TheCanadian: Nuxalk First Nation of Bella Coola Pull out of National Energy Board Enbridge Process
• 2012/04/06: CBC: Bishops say Northern Gateway pipeline hearings must be fair
  Anglican bishops in B.C. and the Yukon are calling on the Northern Gateway pipeline hearings to demonstrate integrity, fairness and freedom from political pressure. Six bishops signed the statement issued on Good Friday. They say comments by federal officials have raised concerns that the National Energy Board hearings may be subject to improper time constraints and industry influence.
• 2012/04/05: G&M: Pipeline review process hits another snag as second native band pulls out
  The federal review of the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline has hit another setback this week after a coastal first nation community withdrew from the process, saying the Harper government has predetermined the outcome.
• 2012/04/05: BCLSB: Make It Five
• 2012/03/28: FinPo: PetroChina bids to help build $5.5-billion Northern Gateway pipeline
• 2012/04/03: BCLSB: The Calgary Herald Editorial Writers Tell Lies
• 2012/04/01: G&M: First nations school protests Northern Gateway pipeline
  Public hearings on the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline resume on Monday in the coastal community of Bella Bella, where the federal review panel was met by protesting students and teachers from the local first nations school. Staff at the Bella Bella Community School organized the protest to greet the panel members as they arrived on Sunday. Some of the students have launched a hunger strike as well to protest against the plan by Enbridge to transport Alberta's oil-sands crude across B.C. to reach markets in Asia and California.
• 2012/04/02: CBC: Gateway hearing cancelled after protesters greet panel
  A public hearing for the Northern Gateway Project has been unexpectedly cancelled after panel members were met by protesters at the Bella Bella airport on Sunday afternoon. The review panel was scheduled to hold four days of hearing in the remote B.C. community to hear local concerns about the controversial proposal to build a crude oil pipeline from Alberta to the West Coast. A large crowd greeted the panel members when they arrived in Bella Bella, but later on Sunday afternoon Monday's hearing was cancelled.

The Mackenzie Valley pipeline is being slowed down:

• 2012/04/05: CBC: Mackenzie Valley pipeline funding reduced
  The pace of development of the $16.2 billion Mackenzie Valley pipeline, an energy megaproject that has been proposed and debated for decades, has been cut back. The five-member consortium made the announcement Thursday, blaming low prices for natural gas and ongoing negotiations with the federal government on incentives to lower the costs of the project.

In BC, the stage is set. Now what will Clark and Dix do?

• 2012/04/02: Tyee: Seeds of BC Liberal Rebellion -- Why Premier Clark has her hands full keeping her own party in line
• 2012/04/04: PI:B: Exemptions for greenhouse growers set poor precedent for carbon tax review
• 2012/04/06: TheCanadian: Christy Clark Must Go
• 2012/04/03: PostMedia: B.C. grants carbon tax relief to greenhouse growers
  British Columbia has granted $7.6 million to the province's greenhouse vegetable and flower growers to compensate them for the cost of the carbon tax on natural gas and propane consumption. The one-time cash infusion for the most energy-intensive corner of the agrifoods sector is intended to restore the competitive edge growers lost when B.C. implemented the carbon tax in 2008, said Agriculture Minister Don McRae.
• 2012/04/02: G&M: Poll reveals 'monumental collapse' in support for BC Liberals
  Premier Christy Clark's mantra-like pleas for support from so-called free-enterprise voters to avoid a split that would elect the NDP are beginning to have a hollow ring, according to the latest public-opinion poll in the province. The survey by Angus Reid found the governing BC Liberals and the BC Conservatives neck and neck in popular support, each with 23 per cent, while the NDP remains far in front at 43 per cent.

Meanwhile in that Mechanical Mordor known as the tar sands:

• 2012/04/03: PostMedia: Scientists continue oilsands battle in journal
  A Royal Society of Canada panel that assessed environmental impacts of oilsands development and a prominent Alberta ecologist have started a new round in a debate on the pages of a prestigious scientific journal about whether the original report overlooked some consequences of industrial development.
• 2012/04/02: CBC: Encana looks for partners -- Analyst says energy giant could be a takeover target
  Calgary-based natural gas producer Encana Corp. said Monday it is trying to find partners to pony up cash to develop its oil and liquids-rich properties, leading one analyst to speculate it could be a takeover target.

The Alberta election is livening things up:

• 2012/04/05: Tyee: Albertans Get Bum Deal from Oil Industry: Report
  Low royalties deprive province of 'significant, increasing amounts of potential revenue.'
• 2012/04/05: Tyee: Eco-Policies of Alberta's Next Government?
  Speed up oil sands, give $300 in petro proceeds to each citizen, says surging Wildrose party.
• 2012/04/08: PostMedia: Fight between 'blue' and 'red' conservatives may turn air purple, political experts say

  While in Saskatchewan:

• 2012/04/02: BCLSB: Dennis Gruending On The Sale Of The Saskatchewan Wheat Pool

  Ontario is wrestling with its energy policy:

• 2012/04/05: CornwallFN: Ezra Levant Attacks Ontario's Future
• 2012/04/07: CBC: Ontario couple loses wind turbines property tax case -- Review board rules no evidence nearby wind turbines devalued homes
• 2012/04/03: TStar: Wind power crosswinds blast McGuinty government
• 2012/04/03: CBC: Wind farm files $1-billion lawsuit against Ontario
  Ontario's Liberal government is facing a $1-billion lawsuit for imposing a moratorium on offshore wind farms. SouthPoint Wind filed suit in Ontario Superior Court of Justice in Windsor, Ont., claiming damages for the confiscation of its property and reimbursement of its costs. The company tried to develop wind power projects near the communities of Leamington, Union and Kingsville before the government announced a moratorium on offshore wind farms in February 2011.

As for miscellaneous Canadiana:

• 2012/04/04: TreeHugger: Gas Prices In Canada Hitting Record Highs, US$ 5.68 per Gallon, And They Can't Blame Obama

  The movement toward a long term ecologically viable economics is glacial:

• 2012/04/05: Smithsonian: Looking Back on the Limits of Growth
  Forty years after the release of the groundbreaking study, were the concerns about overpopulation and the environment correct?
• 2012/04/03: CCurrents: True Sustainability Solutions
• 2012/04/03: CCurrents: Time Running Out to Ensure Sustainable Prosperity For All
• 2012/04/03: CCurrents: Nine Low-Tech Steps For Community Resilience In A Warming Climate
• 2012/04/03: CCurrents: The Four Laws Of Ecology And The Four Anti-Ecological Laws Of Capitalism
• 2008/05/14: OurFuture: Why Change Happens: Ten Theories
• 2012/04/03: AlterNet: 10 Big Mistakes People Make in Thinking About the Future
• 2012/03/19: GwynneDyer: Global Civilisation: The Options
• 2012/04/03: PaiD: Gwynne Dyer on Our Future
• 2012/04/02: EnergyBulletin: The influence of Donella Meadows and the Limits to Growth
• 2012/04/01: P3: Economic growth and sustainability question

  IPAT [Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology] raised its head once again:

• 2012/04/07: al Jazeera: Libertarians get medieval on women
  Debates on birth control in the US show how modern conservatism is just a neoliberal gloss on medieval domination.
• 2012/04/04: RawStory: Arizona bill would declare pregnancy 2 weeks before conception
• 2012/04/03: RawStory: Nikki Haley: 'Women don't care about contraception'
  Republican South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley on Tuesday said that the Obama administration had made a mistake by mandating that health insurance cover birth control because "women don't care about contraception."
• 2012/04/04: CCP: Climate Denial bubbles work over time as gumbies in an Orwellian Newspeak attack on sociology professor Kari Norgaard
• 2012/04/04: CCP: Rush Limbaugh keeps attacking women, now it is University of Oregon sociology professor Kari Norgaard's turn for writing about climate change deniers
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: The Root of the Conservative War on Contraception Comes From a Deep-seated Anxiety

  How do the media measure up?

• 2012/04/02: MediaMatters: Fox Again Turns To Tabloid For Climate Science
• 2012/04/02: CJR: Q&A: The NYT's Justin Gillis -- The recent Oakes Award winner talks about how to keep climate on the front page
• 2012/04/05: CCP: Brad Johnson: New York Times Reporter Justin Gillis Criticizes His Paper For 'Scandal' Of 'Dodging' How Global Warming Is Poisoning Our Weather
• 2012/04/05: TP:JR: Politico Slams 'A $2 Billion Solar Mistake -- From The Media'
• 2012/04/05: TreeHugger: CNN Meteorologist Connects Extreme Weather to Climate Change (Video)
• 2012/04/03: CCurrents: The ABC, Australia's BBC, Turns Climate Inaction Truth Upside-Down Downunder [Polya]
• 2012/04/03: SMandia: Wall Street Journal - Dr. William Happer is Wrong Again
• 2012/04/03: BCLSB: The Calgary Herald Editorial Writers Tell Lies

  Here is something for your library:

• 2012/04/02: CER:RRapier: Power Plays is Published
  [Book Plug] _Power Plays: Energy Options in the Age of Peak Oil_ by Robert Rapier

And for your film & video enjoyment:

• 2012/04/06: Grist: New [Promised Land] film about fracking stars Matt Damon, John Krasinski, and maybe you
• 2012/04/06: TreeHugger: Coal Rules, Occupy Wall Street Sucks: Coal Industry (Video)
• 2012/04/05: DeSmogBlog: On 2nd Anniversary of Upper Big Branch Mine Disaster, Documentary Explores Lasting Impacts of Mountaintop Removal
• 2012/04/05: LeDaro: Hydraulic Fracking and environmental perils
• 2012/04/03: PSinclair: Heartland: The Leading Edge of Ignorance
• 2012/04/03: TP:JR: Here's What An 'Extraction Economy' Looks Like
• 2012/04/01: EnergyBulletin: My 'Gasland' 'Tis of Thee

  Meanwhile among the 'Sue the Bastards!' contingent:

• 2012/04/06: PostGazette: EPA faces suit from 11 groups over coal ash
  Eleven environmental organizations are suing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to force it to better regulate toxic coal ash and citing recent groundwater contamination at 29 coal ash dump sites in 16 states, including two in Western Pennsylvania.
• 2012/04/06: TreeHugger: Environmental Groups Sue the EPA Over Delay on Coal Ash Regulations
• 2012/04/05: PortlandTrib: Environmental groups sue to block wind turbines on Steens Mountain
  Oregon Natural Desert Association and Audubon Society of Portland oppose development
• 2012/04/04: SwissInfo: Chevron and Transocean face Brazil lawsuits
  A Brazilian prosecutor has filed a lawsuit against oil giant Chevron and Swiss-based offshore driller Transocean, for an oil leak northeast of Rio de Janeiro. This is the second civil case against the companies in less than five months. They now faces charges of R$40bn (SFr20bn) in Brazil after this second leak off the coast in 2012.
• 2012/04/05: BBerg: NRC Pilgrim Plant Hearings Appealed by Massachusetts AG
  The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's decision to proceed with hearings on a 20-year license extension for Entergy Corp. (ETR)'s Pilgrim nuclear power plant was appealed by Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley. Coakley's appeal, filed in the U.S. Appeals Court in Boston, challenged the commission's decision to go ahead before considering lessons from the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, according to a statement from her office today.
• 2012/04/05: SlashDot: The Supreme Court To Rule On Monsanto Seed Patents
• 2012/04/04: DeSmogBlog: Young Americans Sue Government to Stop Global Warming, Polluter Interests Granted Intervention To Defend
• 2012/04/04: BBC: Chile court rules in favour of Patagonia HidroAysen dam
• 2012/04/04: BBerg: Chevron Brazil Suits Double to $22 Billion With New Claim
• 2012/04/04: al Jazeera: Brazil prosecutor targets oil giants
  Chevron and Transocean reject latest $10.9bn lawsuit as "arbitrary" and "without merit". A Brazilian federal prosecutor has launched a second $10.9bn lawsuit against US oil company Chevron and drilling company Transocean following the discovery of a second leak in the offshore Frade oil field earlier this month. The new lawsuit, announced on Tuesday by the federal public prosecutor's office, is prosecutor Eduardo Santos de Oliveira's second civil case against the companies in less than five months. The case also seeks to prevent Chevron and Transocean from operating in Brazil, transferring Brazilian profits overseas, obtaining government-backed finance and moving equipment from the country, the statement said. The prosecutor's office said that Santos de Oliveira also planned to investigate Brazilian national oil regulator ANP and environmental protection agency Ibama over their handling of the November spill and latest leak, discovered on March 4, at the Frade field, northeast of Rio de Janeiro.
• 2012/04/03: ABC(Au): Legal action taken over alleged GM contamination
  A farmer in Western Australia's Great Southern region is suing a neighbour after his property was allegedly contaminated by genetically modified canola.
• 2012/04/02: ABC(Au): Coal miner found guilty
  A large coal miner has been found guilty of polluting water in NSW. Moolarben Coal has been fined 105-thousand dollars after being convicted in the Land and Environment Court of allowing runoff to enter waterways near Mudgee in 2009.

Wrestling over a new energy infrastructure continues unabated:

• 2012/04/06: EurActiv: Britain opens £20 mln wave power contest
• 2012/04/05: UCSUSA:B: On the Road to Clean Energy in Germany: Lessons for the United States - Part 2
• 2012/04/05: OPB: Newberry Geothermal Project Gets A Green Light
• 2012/04/07: PeakEnergy: Germany's $263 Billion Renewables Shift Biggest Since War
• 2012/04/08: PeakEnergy: New Zealand to host tidal device testing
• 2012/04/05: Grist: If everyone used as much energy as Americans, we'd run out of oil in 9 years
• 2012/04/03: UDel: Bottling sunlight -- Doctoral student's novel solar reactor may enable clean fuel derived from sunlight
• 2012/04/04: EnergyBulletin: Heat those Feet! by Tom Murphy
• 2012/04/04: UN: Construction of UN-supported hydro power plant begins in Sierra Leone
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: With Fossil Fuels In The Spotlight, Clean Tech Hums Along
• 2012/04/03: Oregonian: Oregon's geothermal industry: 'promising potential, but underachieving'
• 2012/03/28: AlterNet: How to Start Your Own Power Company, Stop Coal and Nukes, and Transform Your City
• 2012/04/03: UCSUSA:B: On the Road to Clean Energy in Germany: Lessons for the United States - Part 1
• 2012/04/02: EnergyBulletin: A new energy third world in North America?
• 2012/04/02: Grist: How butterflies are teaching scientists about better renewable fuels
• 2012/04/02: TreeHugger: What Is Embodied Energy and Why Does It Matter?
• 2012/04/01: AlterNet: How the Big Energy Companies Plan to Turn the United States into a Third-World Petro-State

  Hey! Let's contaminate the aquifer for thousands of years! It'll be a fracking gas!

• 2012/04/06: TP:JR: Shale Shocked: 'Remarkable Increase' In U.S. Earthquakes 'Almost Certainly Manmade,' USGS Scientists Report
• 2012/04/06: ArtVoice: Son of Frackenstein
• 2012/04/07: Tamino: Deja Vu
• 2012/04/07: Tamino: Gutenberg-Richter
• 2012/04/07: SlashDot: USGS Suggests Connection Between Seismic Activity and Fracking
• 2012/04/07: DeSmogBlog: Who Is Monitoring Fracking Wells And Pipelines? Nobody
• 2012/04/04: EurActiv: Chevron suspends shale gas exploration to 'reassure' Romanians
• 2012/04/04: PlanetArk: Chevron Promises Care In Developing Romania Shale Gas
• 2012/04/03: TreeHugger: With New System, Obama Admin to Approve Fracking & Drilling Operations in 1/3rd the Time
• 2012/04/02: HuffPo: Gas Industry Spin Can't Cover Up Air, Water Problems Caused by Fracking
• 2012/04/01: DenverPost: Colorado farms planning for dry spell losing auction bids for water to fracking projects
• 2012/04/02: TreeHugger: Fracking 'Exxposed' In New Video From Water Defense
• 2012/04/02: FuelFix: Fracking chemicals disclosures set off few alarms

  On the coal front:

• 2012/04/07: DeSmogBlog: Spruce Mine Mountaintop Removal Coal Permit Restored
• 2012/04/05: Grist: Clean coal nonsense: New industry ad claims 'real environmental progress'
• 2012/04/02: OPB: On The Ground In Grays Harbor: What's The Word On That New Export Terminal?
  In the past few weeks, EarthFix has begun a regional project to document -- using photos, video, mapping and audio -- what exporting American coal to China could mean for the people in the Northwest.

On the gas and oil front:

• 2012/04/06: BBerg: Closing oil prices Friday
  OIL (US$/bbl)
  Nymex Crude Future...103.31
  Dated Brent Spot.....123.14
  WTI Cushing Spot.....103.31
• 2012/04/08: OilDrum: Tech Talk - Production from Abqaiq, an Ageing Queen
• 2012/04/05: DerSpiegel: Confusion at the Pumps -- Big Oil's Strategy for Jacking Up Gas Prices
  Prices at German gas pumps oscillate wildly, sometimes changing several times a day. The rises and falls are far from random, however. Studies and market observers say it is an attempt by big oil to ratchet up the cost of a fill-up as high as possible.
• 2012/04/06: WaPo: Petroleum institute's numbers on oil policy a matter of dispute
• 2012/04/05: AntiWar: In Bid for Iraqi Crude, Oil Corporations Play Politics
  Exxon, Shell, and BP tread lightly over Iraq's political sectarianism to reign supreme in Iraqi oil production
• 2012/04/05: BBerg: Putin's Port Project to Divert Russia Urals Oil to Baltic
• 2012/04/04: TreeHugger: Gas Prices In Canada Hitting Record Highs, US$ 5.68 per Gallon, And They Can't Blame Obama
• 2012/04/04: EarlyWarning: Oil Wells Drilled
• 2012/04/04: SaudiInFocus: The End of the Saudi Oil Reserve Margin
  Riyadh is less and less able to cushion supply shocks as it consumes more and more of its own oil.
• 2012/04/04: OilDrum: Does the U.S. Really Have More Oil than Saudi Arabia? by Robert Rapier
• 2012/04/03: AutoBG: Volvo CEO challenges EU, says it's "far too early" to dismiss fossil fuels
• 2012/04/04: CCurrents: Does the U.S. Really Have More Oil Than Saudi Arabia?
• 2012/04/02: CCurrents: Crude Price Rrise Could Plunge The World Economy Back Into Recession: IEA Chief Economist
• 2012/04/03: EurActiv: Three Russian companies bid for Greece's gas assets
  As cash-strapped Greece is selling many of its state assets, three Russian companies including Gazprom are bidding to acquire the Greek gas companies DEPA and DESFA, out of a total of 17 bidders from 12 countries.
• 2012/04/03: EarlyWarning: Latest Brent-WTI Spread
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: Shale Oil 'Flaring' Is Dirty Secret Of U.S. Oil Boom
• 2012/04/01: OilDrum: A Review of the Citigroup Prediction on US Energy
• 2012/04/01: DeSmogBlog: Investors: No More Flaring of Fracked Oil and Gas in Bakken Shale

  And in pipeline news:

• 2012/04/02: EurActiv: Bulgaria opens doors to South Stream pipeline
  Bulgaria and Russia have agreed that a final investment decision on the South Stream gas pipeline will be taken in November. Russia is speeding up construction of the pipeline, which will bring Russian gas through the Black Sea to Bulgaria and countries further west.

Yes we have peak everything:

• 2012/04/05: Grist: Terrified by peak oil, FedEx turns to biofuels, efficiency
• 2012/04/02: DerSpiegel: A World without Oil -- Companies Prepare for a Fossil-Free Future
  Drivers may hate rising gas prices, but some companies are delighted as they watch the oil price soar. Firms like BMW and Airbus which are leaders in fuel efficiency actually benefit from expensive oil. They are just two of a growing number of companies that are already developing technologies for a post-fossil-fuel world.
• 2012/04/03: EnergyBulletin: Peak oil denial: How does this help?
• 2012/04/03: EnergyBulletin: Review of Lt. Col. Eggen's thesis, Impact of the Peaking of World Oil Production on the Global Balance of Power
• 2012/04/02: SEasterbrook: Peak X (for many values of X)
• 2012/04/01: MarketOracle: Peak Oil Evasion Tactics Scraping The Barrel

  Biofuel bickering abounds:

• 2012/04/06: NBF: Sapphire Energy is Confident about scaling up Algae Fuel to $85 per barrel by 2018
• 2012/04/07: TP:JR: Biogas Technology: 'Cow Power' Catching On In The U.S.
• 2012/04/02: VBI: Algae biofuels: the wave of the future
• 2012/04/02: SciAm: U.S. Approves 20 Firms to Make Higher-Blend E15 Biofuel
  Twenty companies, including Archer-Daniels-Midland Co and Cargill Inc, have been cleared to produce the new ethanol grade called E15, a significant step toward putting the higher blend biofuel on sale, the government announced on Monday.
• 2012/04/03: Eureka: Is bioenergy expansion harmful to wildlife?
• 2012/04/02: AutoBG: EPA gives E15 go-ahead despite objections, approves production applications

  The answer my friend...:

• 2012/04/06: TP:JR: A Good Deal: The Cape Wind Project Would Reduce Wholesale Electricity Costs Over $250 Million Per Year
• 2012/04/04: Grist: Blown away: Wind power growing faster than other top electricity sources
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: Maryland Is On The Verge Of Becoming A Leader In Clean, Renewable Offshore Wind Energy
• 2012/04/04: TreeHugger: The Future of Wind Power: 9 Cool Innovations

  Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:

• 2012/04/03: Forbes: Collapse of German Solar Companies Threatens California's Big Solar Projects
• 2012/04/06: Grist: Solar 'scandal' upshot: China is dominating global solar market, for better or worse
• 2012/04/04: EurActiv: Solar recession claims another victim
  The German solar power company Q-Cells filed for insolvency yesterday (3 April), the fourth such firm to go bankrupt in four months, as the solar recession gathers pace. Solon SE, Solar Millennium AG and Solarhybrid AG have all declared bankruptcy due to a cocktail of plunging equipment prices, overcapacity and falling government subsidies.
• 2012/04/03: DerSpiegel: Twilight of an Industry -- Bankruptcies Have German Solar on the Ropes
  The German solar industry is at a turning point. The bankruptcy of Q-Cells this week shows that the days of German solar cell production are numbered. Asian competitors took the lead years ago, and German government subsidies were part of the problem.
• 2012/04/02: BBerg: Solar Millennium's U.S. Units File for Bankruptcy Protection
  U.S. units of Solar Millennium AG (S2M), the maker of solar thermal power plants undergoing insolvency proceedings in Germany, filed for bankruptcy protection from creditors and plan to sell some businesses. Solar Millennium Inc., based in Oakland, California, Solar Trust of America LLC and other units listed assets of less than $100 million and debt of as much as $500 million in Chapter 11 papers filed today in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware.
• 2012/04/03: SciAm:SaH: Clouds Over the Solar Industry in Britain
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: Solar Policy Can Advance (Or Delay) Grid Parity By A Decade
• 2012/04/02: 350orBust: Solar Energy Spill Alert
• 2012/04/02: BBC: Solar panel maker Q-Cells to file for bankruptcy
  Q-Cells, once the world's biggest maker of solar panels, is filing for bankruptcy. The German firm says it has abandoned an attempt to refinance its debts and will file for insolvency on Tuesday. Like other solar panel makers, Q-Cells has been hit by falling prices and last year the firm lost 846m euros ($1.1bn; £702m). The company started in 2001 with 19 staff and now employs more than 2,000 workers. Several other German makers of solar equipment have failed recently including Solon, Solar Millennium and Solarhybrid. The industry has been hit by the government's decision this year to cut subsidies for solar power production. Under the system, German power companies were obliged to buy solar power from producers at a fixed price. The government is cutting that rate by up to 30%.

The nuclear energy controversy continues:

• 2012/04/07: BNC: IFR FaD 12 -- lessons learned from fast reactor capital costs
• 2012/04/04: NBF: GE Continues pushing Prism reactor and China makes new CAP1400 facility
• 2012/04/04: AlterNet: Why Nuclear Power Is Not the Answer to Global Warming
• 2012/04/03: NBF: South Korea makes big overseas nuclear energy push
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): Nuclear industry dreams dashed by current economic reality
  It was the financing model and rates of return that prompted German nuclear giants RWC and E.ON to pull out of UK energy plans
• 2012/04/02: EneNews: Fox San Diego: Unprecedented? California nuke plant forbidden from reopening - "We've really never seen the Feds take such a drastic step" - Locals stunned, alarmed (video)

  Nuclear waste storage requires _very_ long term thinking:

• 2012/04/01: CleanBreak: Canada's Chalk River Lab could contribute to solving world's nuclear waste problems

  Nuclear fusion projects around the world limp along:

• 2012/04/04: KSJT: NY Daily News: Columnist gets a case of fatherly fusion fever

  More people are talking about the electrical grid:

• 2012/04/06: P3: An Alternative Smart Grid
• 2012/04/04: Grist: Trade in the 20th century electric grid. Don't trade off local energy
• 2012/04/04: Fraunhofer: Best marketing for renewable energies
• 2012/04/03: Eureka: Advanced power-grid research finds low-cost, low-carbon future in West -- Eliminating coal is least expensive way to achieve greenhouse gas emissions goals

  And then there is the matter of efficiency & conservation:

• 2012/04/05: NBF: Green homes use 80 per cent less energy in Australia
• 2012/04/05: Grist: Google saves energy by cooling its buildings with ice

  Automakers & lawyers, engineers & activists argue over the future of the car:

• 2012/04/06: AutoBG: Monthly record sales for Prius, Volt help drive up March alt-fuel sales almost 40%
• 2012/04/08: TP:JR: How Our Prius Paid For Itself And Put $10,000 Back In Our Pocket
• 2012/04/04: AutoBG: Improving Chevy Volt sales leads GM to shorten summer shutdown
• 2012/04/05: BBerg: Electric-Drive Vehicle Demand Recharged by Gas Prices
• 2012/04/03: Grist: How China will force Americans to drive electric cars

  This week in the Gee Whiz File: In-wheel Motors:

• 2012/04/04: AutoBG: New SIM-WIL electric prototype has 218 mile range, in-wheel motors

  As for Energy Storage:

• 2012/04/06: AutoBG: Lithium-ion battery costs will still be about $400/kWh by 2020 [says Lux Research]
• 2012/04/04: SBO: AES plans to bring big batteries to Oregon's grid
  AES Energy Storage, the Virginia-based subsidiary of $17 billion global power giant The AES Corporation, intends to offer its battery storage technology to Portland General Electric to help the utility bridge resource gaps and incorporate more renewable energy into its mix.

The reaction of business to climate change will be critical:

• 2012/04/02: DerSpiegel: A World without Oil -- Companies Prepare for a Fossil-Free Future
  Drivers may hate rising gas prices, but some companies are delighted as they watch the oil price soar. Firms like BMW and Airbus which are leaders in fuel efficiency actually benefit from expensive oil. They are just two of a growing number of companies that are already developing technologies for a post-fossil-fuel world.
• 2012/04/02: TreeHugger: Rising Oil Costs Spur FedEx to Adopt EVs, Hybrids, & Biofuels

  Insurance and re-insurance companies are feeling the heat:

• 2012/04/06: KSJT: Examiner.com : Insurance companies, climate dice, and extreme weather comin' our way...
• 2012/04/02: CCurrents: Losses From Natural Disasters Reach New Peak in 2011

  Who's fielding theFAQs?

• 2012/04/04: Guardian(UK): What's a carbon footprint and how is it worked out?
• 2012/04/04: ABC(Au): Could we refill the Great Artesian Basin with floodwater?
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): Do temperature records reliably show the planet is warming?

  Joe Romm posts a daily list of top energy and climate stories:

• 2012/04/06: TP:JR: April 6 News...
• 2012/04/05: TP:JR: April 5 News...
• 2012/04/04: TP:JR: April 4 News...
• 2012/04/03: TP:JR: April 3 News...
• 2012/04/02: TP:JR: April 2 News...

  Looks like Michael Tobis is going to post an occasional list as well:

• 2012/04/04: P3: Links of the day

  Other (weekly) lists:

• 2012/04/05: BPA: Agriculture News

  The carbon lobby are up to the usual:

• 2012/04/06: PSinclair: Climate Skeptic Case Wilts in Spring Heat and New Light
• 2012/04/06: DeSmogBlog: S.E. Cupp Attacks Climate Science and Climate Scientists on MSNBC
• 2012/04/05: CornwallFN: Ezra Levant Attacks Ontario's Future
• 2012/04/05: ABC(Au):TDU: Climate deniers jump on the ABC's "dog bites man" story
• 2012/04/06: DeSmogBlog: Heartland Payments to University of Victoria Professor Susan Crockford Probed
• 2012/04/05: CCP: Koch-Funded ALEC Behind State Attempts To 'Reclaim' Your Public Lands
• 2012/04/05: CChallenge: [TVMOB] Update, April 2012, courtesy of SkepticalScience.com
• 2012/04/07: QuarkSoup: Roy Spencer's Entertaining Polynomial Suggests End-of-Days
• 2012/04/07: TP:JR: Yes, Deniers, Global Warming Continues
• 2012/04/05: ClimateShifts: Institute for Public Affairs true colours: under fire from scientists over Plimer book mail out [d & educ]
• 2012/04/04: HotTopic: Prat watch #6: My coup runneth over
• 2012/04/05: SkeptiSci: Monckton Misleads California Lawmakers - Now It's Personal (Part 2) by dana1981
• 2012/04/03: QuarkSoup: Norfolk Constabulary Made the Wrong Charges
• 2012/04/03: IJISH: (Digression) The urge to find "underlying motives for distrusting science" -- my opinion
• 2012/04/03: HotTopic: How to talk to a denier
• 2012/04/03: DeSmogBlog: The Farce Of The "Golden Age Of Gas"
• 2012/04/02: KSJT: LA Times, NPR, etc: So, did we know it all along? Sociologist reports many US rightwingers feel science is liberal social construct
• 2012/04/02: Guardian(UK): The Kochs and the Cato Institute: a hostile takover?
  The rightwing industrialists are locked in a battle for control of a libertarian thinktank. If that sounds contradictory, it's because it is
• 2012/04/02: AlterNet: 6 Reasons the Koch Brothers Had a Very Bad Week

  Meanwhile in the 'clean coal' saga:

• 2012/04/05: TP:JR: 'Clean' Coal Nonsense: New Industry Ad Claims 'Real Environmental Progress'

  As for climate miscellanea:

• 2012/04/07: NatureN: Backing up the biosphere -- After ten years in the business, private-spaceflight pioneer Elon Musk sets his sights on Mars
• 2012/04/07: CCurrents: It's The Time Of The Rights Of Mother Earth
• 2012/04/07: CCurrents: CO2 Rise Drove Global Warming And End Of Ice Age - So Stop Carbon Burning, Return To 300 ppm CO2 [Polya]
• 2012/04/06: NYRB: In the Climate Casino: An Exchange -- Roger W. Cohen, William Happer, and Richard Lindzen, reply by William D. Nordhaus
• 2012/04/05: QuarkSoup: Kevin Trenberth on NPR
• 2012/04/08: Heiko: Why I do not participate in the climate wars anymore
• 2012/04/08: Tamino: L is for "linear"
• 2012/04/05: ERabett: Over in the comments at Rabett Run
• 2012/04/02: TreeHugger: 3,000 Dolphins Found Dead on the Coast of Peru
• 2012/04/02: QuarkSoup: Selection Bias Goes Both Ways
• 2012/04/01: TP:JR: Do 'Hunger Games' Fans Care About Climate Change? Why Would They If They Just See The Movie?

  And here are a couple of sites you may find interesting and/or useful:

• UMt: Ethics of Geoengineering Online Resource Center
• ConservAmerica
• Weather Warnings: Europe
• RealClimate - Acronym index
• Water Defense
• Eradicating Ecocide in Canada - Fundamental Justice and Earth Law for the 99%
• Vote Solar!
• FOE: Friends of the Earth
• WMO: Bulletin
• SORCE: Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment
• The Earth Institute, Columbia University - blogs
• UColorado: Mean Sea Level
• NOAA: Solar Cycle Progression
• Zvon.org guide to Fourth Assessment Report of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
• Wiki: Spörer Minimum
• Wiki: Maunder Minimum
• Wiki: Dalton Minimum

My first novel Water was published in Canada May, 2007. The American release was in October. An Introductionto the novel is available, along with the Unpublished Forewordand the Launch Talk(which includes some quotations), An overview of my writing is available here.

P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.

"The real battle, for sane sustainable safe energy policies, is just beginning, and it will never ever end. We can't allow sociopaths to take the future of the planet and bet it on a roulette table. There are sustainable pathways. They are blocked, however, by vested interests that one way or another will have to get out of the way." -Michael I. Niman

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