By Desi Doyen on 12/20/2012, 3:29pm PT  

 

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Snow is BACK! Winter returns to parched Midwest; Time's "Person of the Year" promises action on climate change, but can he deliver?; Good and Bad 2012: top environmental stories of the year; PLUS: It's the end of the Mayan Apocalypse Myth as we know it! (And we feel fine) ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): WSJ's climate "dynamite" is a dud; U.S. Electric Grid 2030: 100% renewable, 90% of the time; 333 straight warmer than "normal" months; U.K. dash a test for global fracking; 'Peak Farmland' as a good thing; China to overhaul solar industry; Keystone XL won't use advanced spill equipment; Sea otters vs. commercial fishermen; MoJo's Eco-Doom Headline Generator; To the Moon!: yes we can grow plants in space ... PLUS: We'll 'never run this economy on renewables' --- and why we'll never have to ... and much, MUCH more! ...

STORIES DISCUSSED IN TODAY'S 'GREEN NEWS REPORT'...

• AUDIO: Limbaugh: "The New Stupid America. That Should Have Been" Time's Person Of The Year (Media Matters)
• Winter is BACK: Blizzard brings snow to parched Midwest:
• Winter Storm Draco ends record snowless streaks across Midwest (Dr. Jeff Master's Weather Underground) [emphasis added]:
  
  While the heavy snow will create dangerous travel conditions, the .5" - 1.5" of melted water equivalent from the the storm will provide welcome moisture for drought-parched areas of the Midwest. Though much of the moisture will stay locked up as snow for the rest of the year, runoff from the storm may help keep Lake Michigan and Huron from setting an all-time record low for the month of December, and may also keep the Mississippi River at St. Louis above the -5' stage though the end of December. If the river falls below -5', barge traffic on the Mississippi may be forced to halt, costing billions of dollars.
• Storms deliver foot of snow in central US, possible tornado in Alabama (NBC News)
• Drought expands in many farm states (Reuters) [emphasis added]:
  
  Drought continued to expand through many key farming states within the central United States in the past week, as scattered rainfall failed to replenish parched soils, according to a report issued Thursday by state and federal climatology experts.
• TIME's Person of the Year: Obama Again Promises Action on Climate Change:
• President Obama, 2012 Person of the Year: Setting the Stage for a Second Term (TIME Magazine)
• Obama: Climate change among top three priorities for second term (The Hill's E2 Wire)
• Obama Says Climate Change Will be One of His Three Top Priorities in Second Term (Treehugger)
• Good & Bad: A few of the top environmental stories of 2012:
• This Just In: Preliminary Info on 2012 U.S. Billion-Dollar Extreme Weather/Climate Events (NOAA.gov) [emphasis added]
  
  NOAA estimates 2012 will surpass 2011 (exceeding $60 billion, CPI-adjusted to 2012 dollars) in terms of aggregate costs for annual billion-dollar disasters, even with fewer number of billion-dollar disasters.
• NOAA: 2012 To Rank as Second Costliest Year Since 1980 (Climate Central):
  
  During 2012, there were 11 extreme weather and climate events in the U.S. that reached the billion dollar threshold in losses, according to figures released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on Thursday. While the total number of billion dollar natural disasters is down from 2011, when there were a record 14 events costing more than $60 billion, the economic losses this year are expected to exceed last year's tab, largely due to the massive economic toll caused by Hurricane Sandy and the widespread drought.
• Top 10 Environmental Stories of 2012 (Monga Bay)
• Slideshow: Eight Biggest Energy Stories of 2012 (National Geographic)
• Top 10 Sustainable Business Stories of 2012 (Harvard Business Review)
• Wind & Solar Cheapest for Electricity: Calculating the true cost of electricity (Deustche-Welle):
  
  Taking into account health and environmental damage, wind and solar power from new plants in Europe is actually cheaper than energy from coal and nuclear power plants, according to a new report.
• Saudi Arabia reveals plans to be powered entirely by renewable energy (Guardian UK): World's biggest oil producer says it wants to make a 100% switch from fossil fuels to clean energy

• VIDEO: NASA's post-Mayan apocalypse video released 10 days early (Guardian UK):



• NASA debunks Dec. 21 'end of the world' fears (LA Times):
  
  NASA said it has been flooded with calls and emails from people asking about the purported end of the world --- which, as the doomsday myth goes, is apparently set to take place Friday, Dec. 21. And the space agency has one simple response: "The world will not end in 2012."
• Beyond 2012: Why the World Won't End (NASA)

'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (Stuff we didn't have time for in today's audio report)...

• We'll Never Run This Economy On Renewables (We'll Never Have To) (Treehugger):
  
  Whenever we talk about pushing for 100% renewables, naysayers start arguing that we can never run our current economy without energy intensive fossil fuels. But they forget one simple thing: We don't have to.

  In a world where you can address a conference from your own bedroom, or order your groceries or even publish a book without ever getting dressed, the old way of doing things just seems, well, increasingly old.

• WSJ's Climate "Dynamite" Is A Dud (Media Matters):
  
  Let's look at each of those errors, one by one.

  First, Ridley wrongly argues that three variables factored into current climate models are overstated (and thus that climate models are "unproven"). In fact, experts agree that the impacts of each variable that Ridley cites --- the cooling effect of aerosols (or particles in the air); the rate of heat absorption by the world's oceans; and the role of water vapor in amplifying climate change --- are unambiguous....

• November marked 333 straight warmer than "normal" months worldwide (Washington Post) [emphasis added]:
  
  10 of the warmest Novembers have occurred in the past 12 years. The 10 coolest Novembers on record all occurred prior to 1920.
  ...
  [T]he last cooler than average month globally occurred in February, 1985 (almost 28 years ago), "the year the hit film "Back to the Future" [the original, not the sequels] first hit theaters ...To put it another way, if you are under the age of 27, you have never experienced a month in which global average surface temperatures came in below the 20th century average," Freedman writes.
• U.S. will let otters roam along Southern California coastline (LA Times):
  
  After 25 years, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided to end its program of relocating the mammals, calling the effort a failure. Fishermen complain:

  Federal officials turned Southern California into an "otter-free zone" in the late 1980s after moving 140 otters from Monterey Bay to San Nicolas Island, about 60 miles off the coast of Ventura County.

• U.K. Dash for Shale Gas a Test for Global Fracking (National Geographic)
• 'Peak Farmland' Is Here, Experts Predict, As Crop Yields Rise And Population Growth Slows: And that's actually a good thing! (Huffington Post Green)
• Conservative groups urge lawmakers to end wind credit (The Hill's E2 Wire)
• Geoengineering Schemes: Atmospheric governance: (The Economist):
  
  What seems increasingly important to understand, however, is that the need for international cooperation will be if anything more serious in a world that doesn't act to control emissions (or control emissions enough to prevent substantial warming).
• 1st Chevy Volt Owner in USA has Driven 12,000 Miles in 2 Years, Burned 26 Gallons of Gasoline (Treehugger)
• China says it will overhaul solar panel industry by forcing struggling producers to merge (Washington Post)
• Protecting California Coastline as National Monuments (Treehugger)
• Huge power plant gives up on coal, the Times reports with a shrug (Grist):
  
  "Power Company Loses Some of Its Appetite for Coal." This is the best headline The New York Times could come up with.
• The 2,500 Mile Monarch Butterfly Migration: The journey is so long, it takes four generations to make the whole trip! (Treehugger)
• MoJo's Eco-Doom Headline Generator: When climate change takes over, this little robot will carry on if we cannot. (Mother Jones)
• To the Moon!: Plants Grow Fine Without Gravity: New finding boosts the prospect of growing crops in space or on other planets. (National Geographic)
• Keystone XL will not use advanced spill protection tech (FuelFix):
  
  The leak detection technology that will be used on the Keystone XL, for instance, is standard for the nation’s crude oil pipelines and rarely detects leaks smaller than 1 percent of the pipeline’s flow. The Keystone will have a capacity of 29 million gallons per day—so a spill would have to reach 294,000 gallons per day to trigger its leak detection technology.
• Libertarians, engineers, and climate disruption denial: part 1 – libertarians (Scholars & Rogues):
  
  As an electrical engineer myself, however, I didn’t understand how individuals trained in mathematics, science, and logic could fail to see glaring scientific, mathematical, physical, or logical flaws in their own arguments. Eventually, though, something clicked...
• The grid of 2030: all renewable, 90% of the time: Study busts conventional wisdom on price and reliability. (Ars Technica)
• Mercury in seafood: Where does it come from? (Grist):
  
  "Most of the fish that people in the U.S. eat are from the open ocean. And most of the mercury that goes into the open ocean is from atmospheric emissions, which comes from fossil fuel burning," says Chen, a food chain biologist from Dartmouth. Coal-fired power plants are the biggest source, globally.
• West Coast contemplates the calm before the storm: Infrastructure alterations needed as global warming makes mark on planet (Vancouver Sun)
• How Corruption Is Strangling U.S. Innovation (Harvard Business Review) [emphasis added:
  
  [T]his isn't the overt, "bartering of government favors in return for private kickbacks" corruption. Instead, this type of corruption has actually been legalized. And it is strangling both US competitiveness, and the ability for US firms to innovate.

  The corruption to which I am referring is the phenomenon of money in politics.

• New Research: World on Track for Climate Disaster:
• COVER STORY: It's Global Warming, Stupid (Businessweek):
  
  Yes, yes, it's unsophisticated to blame any given storm on climate change. Men and women in white lab coats tell us-and they're right-that many factors contribute to each severe weather episode. Climate deniers exploit scientific complexity to avoid any discussion at all.
  ...
  If all that doesn't impress, forget the scientists ostensibly devoted to advancing knowledge and saving lives. Listen instead to corporate insurers committed to compiling statistics for profit.
• CO2 Emissions Rises Mean Dangerous Climate Change Now Almost Certain (Guardian)
• With Carbon Dioxide Emissions at Record High, Worries on How to Slow Warming (NY Times)
• Arctic sea ice larger than US melts, UN reports; climate change happening 'before our eyes' (Washington Post)
• Study: Sea Levels Rising 60% Faster Than Projected, Planet Keeps Warming As Expected (Climate Progress)
• Ocean Acidification: Animals are already dissolving in Southern Ocean (New Scientist)
• Global warming targets further out of reach, UN says (Phys.org):
  
  Based on current pledges, global average temperatures could rise by 3 to 5 degrees Celsius (5.4 to 9.0 degrees Fahrenheit) this century --- way above the two degrees Celsius being targeted, said a UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report.
• Thawing of permafrost to be 'major factor' in global warming, warns UN report (UN News Centre)