Royal Dutch Shell became the first major oil and gas company to announce plans to leave a leading U.S. refining lobby due to disagreement on climate policies.In its first review of its association with 19 key industry groups, the company said it had found “material misalignment” over climate policy with the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) and would quit the body in 2020. [node:read-more:link]
Moving defiantly to kick-start the long-stalled Keystone XL oil pipeline, President Trump on Friday issued a new presidential permit for the project – two years after he first approved it and more than a decade after it was first proposed. Trump said the permit issued Friday replaces one granted in March 2017. The order is intended to speed up development of the controversial pipeline, which would ship crude oil from tar sands in western Canada to the U.S. Gulf Coast. [node:read-more:link]
Surface mining on steep slopes overlooking two historic coal towns in Eastern Kentucky could damage their water sources and hurt the potential to boost their economies though tourism, residents said at a hearing Friday.Residents from Benham and Lynch, in Harlan County, urged the state to bar surface mining around the towns.“It’s literally going to destroy the water coming off the mountain,” Carl Shoupe, a former underground miner from Benham, said of proposed mining near the town.
A bill moving quickly through the North Carolina General Assembly would require hundreds of prison facilities, university classrooms and other state buildings to curb energy use by 10 percent — a move that would save over a quarter billion dollars by 2025, according to state officials. “The main purpose of this bill is to save the taxpayers of North Carolina money,” bill sponsor Rep. [node:read-more:link]
What's in a number? When it comes to the $93 trillion estimate for the Green New Deal, the answer is found in a network of interlinked groups: a think tank, its political arm and a super political action committee. [node:read-more:link]
Global energy-related carbon emissions rose to a record high last year as energy demand and coal use increased. [node:read-more:link]
Washington state Democrats are fulfilling some of the hefty aspirations of the Green New Deal with their own climate-change package, one that would raise the cost of producing, processing and transporting farm goods while promising the “equitable distribution of benefits.” To do that, the Democrat-dominated Legislature is considering bills to tax carbon, cap greenhouse gases, make all electricity renewable, mandate more biofuels in gasoline and diesel, and govern by “environmental justice.” [node:read-more:link]
Estrada grew up a few blocks from the border, in a three-room house without indoor plumbing. Rent was $10 per month. At 22, he joined the Nogales Police Department, eventually becoming a captain before running for sheriff in 1992. Estrada, who is serving his seventh term, is currently the longest-serving — and only Hispanic — sheriff in Arizona.Estrada has watched with increasing frustration as Trump continues to ignore the sheriffs along the southern border in his demands for a wall. In a letter released on Jan. [node:read-more:link]
The tragedy of that coastal Alaska paradise is only deepening as it enters another, even darker act.Changes brought by human emissions of carbon dioxide — warming and acidifying ocean waters — have proved as destructive as the spill, and they will not disperse, as the oil eventually did.A rich, complex community of life established on these shores after ice receded 10 millennia ago. It probably takes a period of stability that long for the relationships of a many-channeled food web to develop. [node:read-more:link]
The Maine legislature has approved a bill that would eliminate the state’s controversial “gross metering” rule for solar. The legislation, L.D.91, was introduced in January by State Rep. Seth Berry, R-Maine, to repeal a fee for solar customers that was enacted under the administration of Maine’s previous governor, Paul LePage. [node:read-more:link]
