News Roundup: Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Editor's note: It's an especially busy week for me, and so posting will likely be sparse at best. In the meantime, I would direct you to the following sites that are doing an excellent job of compiling some credible news sources:
LATOC Breaking News
Washington's Blog

Gulf Disaster:

Dark Conspiracies of the Gulf (Audio & transcript)

Gulf Prepares for Possible Blackouts

Methane in Gulf "astonishingly high": U.S. scientist

Agriculture/Gardening:

Energy Use in the US & Global Agri-Food Systems: Implications for Sustainable Agriculture
Vietnamese gardeners in New Orleans offer much food for thought

News Roundup: Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Gulf Disaster:

Oil spill containment efforts could be putting strain on damaged well

Well design may be hampering spill efforts

Leaked report: Government fears Deepwater Horizon well could become unchecked gusher

Officials Predict Mental Health Problems Similar To Post-Valdez Alaska
BP was told about faulty drill safety equipment weeks before disaster
Oil Rig Worker: Blowout Preventer was Leaking

Are We to Believe Gulf Doomsday Talk?

Oil:

Christian Science Monitor: After BP oil spill, 'peak' oil seems nearer than ever

Water:
Jordan among region's water poorest countries - report

Extreme Weather:
Extreme Weather in Jakarta
Weather shift seen as mercury soars in Qatar

Environment:

Navy Official Discusses Climate Change Investment Strategy

Evidence for a Consensus on Climate Change
Astrobiology Magazine: A History of Climate Change
On HBO, one man's journey into a natural gas crisis
Sea rises faster as ice melts, Cambridge researchers find

Study questions credentials of climate-change skeptics

Agriculture/Gardening:
Roundup resistant weeds pose environmental threat

Commentary:

Washington's Blog: Experts: BP Lowballing Size of Leaking Oil Reservoir

News Roundup: Weekend of June 19-20, 2010

News Quote of the Day:
"A movement of Haitian farmers and other small-scale producers, have rejected a donation by US agricultural giant Monsanto. The Peasant Movement of Payaye has said it will burn 60,000 sacks of vegetable and corn seeds totaling 475 tons at a value of $4 million that the company donated, in partnership with USAID, following the deadly January earthquake. Other farmers´ groups have long-protested the use of genetically-modified seeds, arguing they threaten the poor nation´s biodiversity." from here.

Gulf Disaster:
Leaked BP memo gives far worse spill figure
Oil Coating Seafloor and Killing Fish, Crabs ... and the American Dream
Life aboard the drilling rig that's the Gulf's last hope
Vast amounts of methane in Gulf spill pose threat
Gulf residents slam BP CEO for yacht outing
NOAA Conducts Tests to Determine Fate of Whale Found Dead in Gulf of Mexico
Schultz: Dish soap won't clean politicians' oil-smudged fingerprints

Extreme Weather:
132 killed in massive flooding in southern China

Global Economy:
French government announces plan for pension cut

Economy USA:
California on 'verge of system failure’
In budget crisis, states take aim at pensions

Oil:
Anger grows across the world at the real price of 'frontier oil'

Water:

General Energy:
How low can you go: Milwaukeeans plan to "power down"
Stay Cool This Summer With Natural Cooling Methods

Environment:
British Newspaper Apologizes to Climate Scientist
How much further must logistics firms go to protect the environment?

Agriculture/Gardening:
Monsanto's Unwelcome Donation

Commentary:
Richard Heinberg: Deepwater Horizon: The Worst-Case Scenario

News Roundup: Friday, June 18, 2010

News Quote of the Day:

"Painting themselves as heroic dissenters and promoting long-discredited contrarian themes, professional [climate change] deniers have insisted on equal time -- and they have used that time to slander scientists who are better at resolving complex technical issues than at playing politics with public relations people. Knowing that nothing in science can be proven absolutely, the deniers tell us to do nothing until we have absolute proof -- while they profit from the status quo -- and the problem continues to get worse." from here.

Gulf Disaster:

BP Using Mercenaries To Prevent Journalists From Talking To Workers

Tony Hayward Benched, BP Says

Oil Spill May Cause Methane Poisoning, Completely Wiping Out Life In Parts Of Gulf
Relief well progressing quicker than expected
Oil spill: Russian President Dmitry Medvedev fears BP's 'annihilation'

Cracks Show BP Was Battling Gulf Well as Early as February

Mounting Data Reveal Gulf Spill as Unique to BP, Aberrant of Industry Norms

Rumor: BP Has To Quietly Ask 7 Overseas Banks For $1 Billion Each Because No U.S. Bank Will Help

Containment system capturing some gushing oil in gulf faces uncertain future

Global Economy:

Is China Secretly Stealth-Buying Gold?

Economy USA:

Could you survive in 1909?
Goldman Delivers The Bad News: No Jobs Explosion Is Coming To Save The Economy

Oil:
Crude Oil Realities

Far From Gulf, a Spill Scourge 5 Decades Old

Solar:

Charge of the light brigade: How quantum dots may improve solar cells

General Energy:
Smart Policies for a 21st Century Grid

Creating a Game Plan for the Transition to a Sustainable U.S. Economy

How Durable Are Small-Scale Wind Turbines?

Environment:
Ocean Ecosystems Transforming Due to Climate Change
HBO documentary 'Gasland' an unsettling look at hazards of natural gas drilling

Climate change deniers doing a disservice to legitimate science

Scientist gives human extinction warning

Agriculture/Gardening:
TIME: How Frankenfood Prevailed

Commentary:

Michael Snyder: Who Died And Made BP The King Of The Gulf Of Mexico?
Ana Joanes: The Fight Against Monsanto in Haiti

The New Republic: Tackling Climate Change

News Roundup: Thursday, June 17, 2010

News Quote of the Day:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
An Energy-Independent Future
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Gulf Disaster:

Global Economy:

Troubled banking system, Spain loom over EU summit

Spanish labour reforms fail to calm markets worried by bailout rumours

Europe braces for the release of bank stress tests

Athens public transport grinds to halt amid strike

2014 will determine course of century, says Cambridge professor

Water:

Afghanistan's Kabul Basin faces major water challenges

General Energy:
China's Energy Grab Is No Green Affair

Environment:

Cutting greenhouse gases will be no quick fix for our weather, scientists say
Freak floods in US predicted by 2009 climate change report
US Climate Bill Teetering

Big Oil Plays Defense
Can painting a mountain restore a glacier?

Agriculture/Gardening:

"No till" is a big white lie

News Roundup: Wednesday, June 16, 2010

News Quote(s) of the Day:
"For decades, we have known the days of cheap and easily accessible oil were numbered. For decades, we've talked and talked about the need to end America's century-long addiction to fossil fuels. And for decades, we have failed to act with the sense of urgency that this challenge requires."
- President Barack Obama, 06-05-10

"The reality is that nothing significant has been done to deal with our energy crisis because tackling it will require fundamental changes to our economy—to our transport and food systems, even to our financial institutions. Until we are willing to honestly face the fact that an "American dream" based on ever increasing rates of consumption of non-renewable resources is a dead end, and that we will have to dramatically cut back on energy usage in order to make a transition away from fossil fuel dependency, all discussion about renewable energy, efficiency standards, and energy research is fairly pointless."

- Richard Heinberg

Gulf Disaster:

Growing evidence that the well is damaged below the sea floor? (via Washington's Blog)

BP Hires Mercenaries to Block Oily Beaches

BP Agrees To Put $20B In Escrow Account For Spill Claims

Dr.Riki Ott alleges BP engaged in massive cover-up to hide Gulf Disaster damage (Video)
Oil estimate raised to 35,000-60,000 barrels a day
Obama accuses BP of recklessness in TV address
Experts: Oil spill poses health threats, but seafood on market is safe

BP starts up second spill containment system; flow rate estimate updated

BP starts burning oil from leaking ruptured well
BP Swaps Rise to Record at 39% Odds of Default

Global Economy:
Euro Zone Inflation Rises

British Economy may never recover from banking crisis, warns OBR

Economy USA:

Economists Examine Potential for Longer Recession (Video)

Kicked Out of Their Homes, Kicking and Screaming

Oil:

Water:
How Do You Conserve Water at Home?

General Energy/Resources:
Biofuels: the U.S. doesn't have enough water to support large production

Environment:

Freak Flash Floods Kill 15 in Southeastern France

Is New Environmentalism the Answer or the Problem?

New Supercomputer Will Track Climate Change

Climate change 'dangerous for alpine regions'

Agriculture/Gardening:

Scientists Say New Farm Chemical 'Will Cause Disease and Illness'

Commentary:

Richard Heinberg: A Tepid Plea for Unspecified Change

Jeff Rubin: What's Plan B?

Tom Whipple: The Peak Oil Crisis: A Speech to the Nation

News Roundup: Tuesday, June 15, 2010

(Editor's note: The breaking news page is back up and running over at LATOC after a week's hiatus. As a rule I try to augment and not duplicate the stories they link to (despite a few instances of doing so below), but I will remind you that it's definitely worth your time to read them, and especially today's.)

News Quote of the Day:

"June so far is a strange ebb tide of of events relating to the world's money, but when the water goes out like that, you know it's sure to return before long, and the peaceful mud-flats of June may vanish under a summer tsunami. I know I'm not alone in the creepy feeling that really nothing has been sorted out and the world is waiting to get hammered six days to Sunday by the consequences of living too large for too long. The markets have been stranded, too, gyrating on the peculiar life-support of robot-traders -- since all the humans have packed up and left the scene for higher ground. The corporate creaming-off of anything not nailed down in America continues apace, with the cream ending up as icing on the petit fours passed around the twilight lawns of East Hampton."

James Howard Junstler, from here.

Gulf Disaster:

AP Poll: Majority disapprove of Obama on oil spill

Oil Executives Tell Committee That BP Spill Is an Aberration

The Other Half of the Geyser

Oil Spill May Cost $4.3 Billion in Property Values

Global Economy:

Austerity Budgets Could Rock Europe

German investor confidence tumbles amid crisis
Spain, Portugal Must Specify Budget Steps, EU Says

Economy USA:

Obama Warns Of 'Massive Layoffs Of Teachers, Police, And Firefighters

New York State Prepares for Government Shutdown, Just in Case

Bank profits rise, but so do bad loans

Home-Builder Confidence Tumbles

California's economic problems to linger throughout 2010

1.6 million more Americans volunteered in 2009

Oil/Resources:

Boycott Big Oil? Prepare to give up your lifestyle

What The Gulf Spill Means For The Future Of Oil

Why we may never be able to say goodbye to oil (Editor's Note: This is the BBC reporting on Peak Oil, which is now hitting the mainstream media in a big way).

Quebec and Ontario must get off oil, green groups say

Peak Metals - What happens when we run out?

General Energy:

New Poll Finds Strong Support for Clean Energy Policies Among Small Business Owners

Environment:

String of floods raise climate change questions

Australian scientists put the heat on climate change sceptics

Push to tax carbon consumption instead of production

In Bangladesh, flash floods and landslides kill 58

Agriculture/Gardening:
Industrial Farming Slows Climate Change?
(Editor's Note: Perhaps attempting to assess the entire environmental impact of an exceedingly complex system of farming involving a vast and ever evolving number of potentially toxic compounds by a single metric (CO2 emissions) is a bit myopic?)

Picking GE cotton: a pricy move for Indian cotton farmers

Commentary:

Wendy Gordon: Hitting Bottom in our Addiction to Oil

Steve Valk: Record Flooding is Pearl Harbor Moment for Climate Change

Charles Hugh Smith: What We Don't Know and Don't Want to Know

David Cohen: The Facts of Life