People who work in poor countries to try save animals are some of the noblest people on the planet.

http://wwf.panda.org/

Elephants are the largest living land mammals on the planet.
Incredibly intelligent and social, they have no real predators in the wild. Except humans.

Due to their magnificent ivory tusks, which are carved and sold as luxury ornaments, elephants have been hunted for centuries. Now they are diminishing at such a rapid pace, that we risk losing them for good.

Join the million voices against illegal wildlife trade on our Facebook page and stay up to date with latest developments and campaign actions.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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First on the list of actual green active organizations is Greenpeace. As with most activists organizations, you like them or you hate them based on those actions. When they challenge the whalers, I applaud. When they unroll banners from bridges over the Mississippi River or chain themselves up in trees, I must admit I become embarrassed. I have never been a member needless to say.

http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/

Happy whales have sanctuaries

My Greenpeace colleagues aboard the Rainbow Warrior in the Indian Ocean shared a heartwarming experience when a frolicking group of humpback and minke whales put on quite a show. It’s not a stretch to say these whales were happy and playful. Why wouldn’t they be as the entire Indian Ocean is a whale sanctuary where they can live in peace? What a contrast this is to other parts of the world where whales not only don’t have protections but face a myriad of direct threats from humans. One huge emerging threat to whales, dolphins and other marine wildlife is happening now in the coastal waters of California. Read more

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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First let me cite one of the best lists of environmental groups I have found and the source of this meditation.

http://www.world.org/weo/environment

The first group on that list is unusual. While the cover page says there is more to come, this site gives you various breakdowns of data about the pollution going on in your neck of the woods. Kind of scary actually. Go to the site and check in. All you got to do is type in your zip code to get started. (do not type it below – it will not work)

http://scorecard.goodguide.com/

Get an in-depth pollution report for your county, covering air, water, chemicals, and more.

Your Zip Code:

More Facts on Pollution

Get answers to the most commonly asked questions on nationwide pollution.

Scorecard is now back in the hands of the team that first created this service in 1998 while they were working for the Environmental Defense Fund. We are currently working on updating the site’s chemical profiles and health hazards information and are about to begin a comprehensive update of the site’s environmental data.

Scorecard is sponsored by GoodGuide, the world’s largest and most reliable source of information on the health, environmental, and social impacts of consumer products. If you want to find products that are healthy, green and socially responsible, support us by downloading our transparency toolbar or our mobile applications.

Bill Pease, Ph.D.
Chief Scientist
GoodGuide
bill@goodguide.com

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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But I imagine the whole “front range” of the rocky mountains is. Usually you think of deserts but really sunshine falls everywhere and the higher you go the more intensity it generates. So we close the week with this:

http://www.myenergysolution.com/energy-savings-blog/

Colorado Solar Power

Despite Colorado’s fame as a skiing destination, Denver actually ranks 30^th of 174 major U.S. cities in terms of sunshine potential, not far behind Honolulu and Miami. In fact, Colorado has the third highest installed solar PV generation capacity of any U.S. state (source: IREC US Solar Market Trends 2009). As a result of innovative policies and greater awareness of environmental issues, Colorado was an early adopter of solar energy systems. As of the end of 2009, the state had 59 megawatts of installed solar PV capacity, third highest among U.S. states despite the fact that the state ranks 22^nd in terms of population. In addition, Colorado installed 53.6 megawatts of solar power in 2010, ranking Colorado fourth in the nation, which was double the output for 2009 (23.4 megawatts). Home to natural gas, oil and some of our nation’s best solar rebates, Colorado plays an important role in the United States’ energy industry. Colorado was the first state to create a Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS), through a 2004 ballot initiative. Originally, the RPS mandated that all utilities with more than 40,000 customers provide at least 10% of their electricity from a renewable energy source. Through additional improvements, it is now mandated that by 2020 investor-owned utilities must provide 30% and cooperatives and municipal utilities with over 40,000 must provide 10% of their retail load from renewable energy sources. Investor-owned utilities also have a distributed generation requirement, which is good news for solar owners. By 2020, 3% of the retail load must come from customer solar electric systems, rather than huge solar farms. This means that investor-owned utilities will continue to offer fantastic solar incentives to consumers to increase the number of residential and commercial solar systems

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Go there and read. More next week.

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This is pretty mundane from my perspective. The US is building 100s of wind farms around the country. The coasts are places where the wind is most powerful and consistent. Are the number accurate? Who knows? They likely would be higher than what is stated, so why worry about that?

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/09/17/858551/offshore-wind-on-the-atlantic-cost-could-create-300000-jobs-and-200-billion-in-economic-activity/?mobile=nc

Offshore Wind On The Atlantic Cost Could Create 300,000 Jobs And $200 Billion In Economic Activity

By Climate Guest Blogger on Sep 17, 2012 at 3:12 pm

by Silvio Marcacci, via CleanTechnica

America has some of the best offshore wind resources in the world — especially along the Atlantic coastline. But while the promise is massive, zero turbines are currently spinning in U.S. waters.

Fortunately, federal and state governments have made significant progress toward the first offshore turbines and have put America at a turning point toward harnessing the more than 1,300 gigawatts (GW) of energy generation potential identified along our coasts. Harnessing a realistic fraction of offshore wind’s potential — 52GW — could power 14 million homes with clean electrons while creating over 300,000 new jobs and $200 billion in new economic activity in some of our biggest cities.

These findings come from “The Turning Point for Atlantic Offshore Wind Energy,” a new report from the National Wildlife Foundation (NWF) outlining the energy and economic benefits offshore wind could create in the U.S., highlighting progress made to date, and detailing policy action needed to realize the industry’s potential.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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I do not normally post anything that is purely environmental. I don’t have to. The energy business destroys the Earth everyday. But Honey Bee Colony Collapse is dangerous. Our food supply is under enough pressure as it is.

http://saveourenvironment.org/

Ask the EPA to ban the pesticide that’s killing our honey bees NOW.

Doug, Honey Bees In Peril! Pesticides like clothianidin may be killing our honey bees by the billion. The EPA wants to wait until 2018 to finish reviewing its safety but our honey bees can’t wait 6 more years. And every bee colony that collapses threatens the future of our food supply… Contact the EPA to help save our honey bees today. Since 2006, our honey bees have been dying off in droves. Billions of bees have disappeared in the U.S. with losses estimated at 30% per year.1 And if the destruction of a species is disturbing enough on its own, the collapse of honey bee populations also threatens the security of our food supply since honey bee pollination is crucial to the cultivation of a full 1/3 of our food here in the U.S. Urge the EPA to stop dragging its feet and take steps NOW to stem the collapse of honey bee colonies across the country. Scientists have been scrambling to figure out what is behind this crisis – termed Colony Collapse Disorder – and believe it is probably the result of many interacting factors, including one widely used class of pesticides called neonicotinoids. One such chemical, called clothianidin, is produced by the German corporation Bayer CropScience. It is used as a treatment on crop seeds, including corn and canola which happen to be among honey bees’ favorite foods. Unfortunately, the EPA is refusing to make any changes until it completes its review of the safety of clothianidin in 2018 – but our honey bees (and bee keepers, rural communities and farmers) can’t wait that long. Tell the EPA: Ban the use of this pesticide that may be wiping out our honey bees before it’s too late. Shockingly, no major independent study has verified the safety of this pesticide. While clothianidin has been used on corn – the largest crop in the U.S. – since 2003, it was officially approved by the Environmental Protection Agency in 2010 on the basis of a single study, conducted by Bayer. But leaked EPA documents2 expose a more sordid story. Agency scientists who reviewed Bayer’s study determined that the evidence was unsound and should not have been allowed as the basis for an unconditional approval of the pesticide. Additional independent studies have shown that neonicotinoid pesticides like clothianidin are highly toxic to honey bees, providing compelling evidence that they should not continue to be approved by the EPA. France, Italy, Slovenia, and Germany have already banned clothianidin over concerns of its role in Colony Collapse Disorder. The stakes are far too high to continue the use of this chemical without independent science verifying that it is safe to use. Ask the EPA to ban the use of clothianidin NOW, not in 2018. Thanks for helping to protect our bees. Mike Town Director, SaveOurEnvironment.org info@saveourenvironment.org 1. http://www.panna.org/sites/default/files/Bees&Pesticides_SOS_FINAL_May2012.pdf 2. http://grist.org/article/food-2010-12-10-leaked-documents-show-epa-allowed-bee-toxic-pesticide/

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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This election offers a clear choice if you are into the environment and advancing energy policies towards a clean energy future. Barack wants to go to clean energy and Mitt wants to go back to the past. I have been disappointed in some of Barack’s decisions or should I say his administration’s decisions. I was totally unhappy with his decision to back the two nuclear power plants in Georgia. I also thought that the Sylendra loan was totally political. Still his strong backing for Wind and Solar is deeply appreciated. More historic however, he has moved the military towards alternative energy. Like I tell people who are you gonna vote for? The other guy?

http://www.barackobama.com/record/environment?source=primary-nav

• President Obama has made protecting the environment a priority, moving us toward energy independence, investing in clean energy jobs, and taking steps to improve the quality of our air and water. As of November 2010, the Obama administration’s policies have helped create hundreds of thousands of jobs in the clean energy industry.

• President Obama enacted the largest expansion of land and water conservation and protected wilderness in a generation. He also created the America’s Great Outdoors initiative to develop a community-led conservation and recreation agenda for the 21st century.

• President Obama is committed to putting in place an “all-of-the-above strategy” to develop every available source of American energy while making sure we never have to choose between protecting our environment and strengthening our economy.

In his most recent State of the Union address, President Obama reiterated his commitment to lessening America’s dependence on foreign oil and investing in clean energy to protect our environment and create jobs.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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But the damage has already been done. The next question is what about next year. First, the seed corn was a total wash this year so right now they are trying to grow enough in Brazil to even get us going next year. But then the next question is when to plant and where. If anybody was a good enough predictor to get in during or right after the late frost then your corn would be fine and you would be sitting on a gold mine. This is contingent on us getting some moisture over the winter. If we don’t get enough moisture well then next year looks bleak.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/aug/30/iowa-corn-crop-drought-farmers-prices?newsfeed=true

• 
• • Dominic Rushe in Des Moines

Thursday 30 August 2012 10.44 EDT

Flying into Des Moines, the corn fields look surprisingly green. America’s midwest produces half the world’s corn and Iowa its largest harvest, yet amid the worst drought in living memory all the untrained eye can see is the occasional brown mark, like a cigarette burn on the baize of a pool table.

But appearances can be deceptive.

In Boone, Iowa, 30 miles away from the state capital, traffic backs up for miles bringing 200,000 people to Farm Progress, the US’s largest agricultural show one. Here, all the talk is of the drought.

Pam Johnson, first vice-president of the National Corn Growers Association, says she can’t remember one as bad as this in her 40 years of farming. “My parents say you have to go back to the 1930s for anything comparable,” she says. In June, her farm in northern Iowa got an inch and a half of rain. “We usually get that a week. In July we got seven-tenths of an inch, for the month.” Rain may be coming soon, thanks to hurricane Isaac, but it’s too late for America’s corn crop.

The US planted 97m acres of corn for this year’s crop – the most since 1937. If everything had gone according to plan, this year’s harvest would have produced a new record, at close to 15bn bushels of corn (a bushel is 24 million metric tonnes). It’s too early to say what the final tally will be, but the US department of agriculture has slashed its forecast to 10.8bn. Dan Basse, president of AgResources, an independent agriculture analyst, says that figure is likely to come down. “We’ve lost 4bn bushels of corn. That’s the largest loss in history, and we could lose another,” he says. The USDA has declared counties in 38 states to be “disaster areas”. About 72% of cattle areas are experiencing drought.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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This drought is so severe that it will take more then a hurricane to end it.  Two or three hurricanes maybe, but this one no way.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/tropical-storm-isaac-could-bring-welcome-rain-to-midwest-but-unlikely-to-break-drought/2012/08/28/3066b0a4-f0e0-11e1-b74c-84ed55e0300b_story.html

Tropical Storm Isaac could bring welcome rain to Midwest but unlikely to break drought

Those areas are among those hard hit by the drought that stretches from the West Coast east into Kentucky and Ohio, with pockets in Georgia and Alabama. The rain that falls inland likely will ease but not eliminate drought, because those areas are so dry, said Mark Svoboda, a climatologist with the National Drought Mitigation Center.

Arkansas rancher Don Rodgers said his area is short 17 inches of rain this year. He said even a couple of inches from Isaac would make a significant difference because he would have water for his cattle and might be able to grow some forage for this winter.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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While I wrote about the higher output temperatures of power plant effluent (water) and the effects on the wild life and the surrounding environment. But the fact is, they have been dropping in production too. I mean if you can cool them, they will melt and for the most part that is a bad thing especially for the nukes. The President of PG&E was crowing about their nuke being cooled by sea water so “as to be not effected” by the drought and climate warming. He may want to rethink that.

http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20120815/nuclear-power-plants-energy-nrc-drought-weather-heat-water

Extreme Heat, Drought Show Vulnerability of Nuclear Power Plants

Reactor shutdown in Connecticut is latest sign that nuclear energy would face challenges from climate change.

Aug 15, 2012

Will 2012 go down as the year that left the idea of nuclear energy expansion in the hot, dry dust?

Nuclear energy might be an important weapon in the battle against climate change, some scientists have argued, because it doesn’t emit greenhouse gases. But separate of all the other issues with nuclear, that big plus would be moot if the plants couldn’t operate, or became too inefficient, because of global warming.

In June, InsideClimate News reported on the findings of Dennis Lettenmaier, a researcher at the University of Washington. His study found that nuclear and other power plants will see a 4 to 16 percent drop in production between 2031 and 2060 due to climate change-induced drought and heat.

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Go there and read. More tomorrow.

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