FILE – In this Monday, Dec. 17, 2012 file photo, a herd of adult and baby elephants walks in the dawn light as the highest mountain in Africa Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania is seen in the background, in Amboseli National Park, southern Kenya. An official with the international police agency Interpol said Tuesday, Dec. 23, 2014 that police arrested alleged ivory trafficker Feisal Ali, who had been on the run for months, at a rental house in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, on Monday evening. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, File)
*Worldwide. Interpol is now taking on “environmental fugitives,” including suspected crime bosses and elephant ivory smugglers. Nine wanted altogether, with two already captured. Just imagine the possibilities.
*Worldwide. Refreshing green energy roundup from Juan Cole: wind turbines in Scotland generated enough energy for 98% of households last year; renewables in Germany supplied 25.8% of total energy “and became the single largest source of electricity”; and Japan is taking off in terms of solar power, with “an enormous floating solar farm” planned for the future.
*Worldwide. Interesting take on “Oil, Power and Psychopaths,” struggles among global power leaders and cliques, culminating in “a complete overthrow of everything that exists today [resulting in] a world none of us would recognize, let alone be able to survive in” unless we’re able to successfully fight and claw our way to a new paradigm.
*USA. Currently, an estimated 2.6 million miles of oil and gas pipelines are in the US (map). From 2000 to 28 Oct 2014, some 335 reported (so far) pipeline accidents occurred. Enbridge’s 600,000 barrels/day Flanagan South pipeline just opened, Enterprise Product Partner’s 450,000 barrels/day Seaway Twin Pipeline did, too. The Saudis are now attempting to saturate Gulf coast refineries with heavy crude priced even lower than current US, Canadian, Mexican and Venezuelan supplies.
*USA. Year end/year beginning summary: continued growth of wind, solar and biomass.
*USA. Do note: “Capital expenditures in the oil sector … are less than 1% of GDP.” And the update is: As of yesterday, Brent was at $52.66/barrel while the US was $49.95, “the lowest level since May 1, 2009; today, Brent is at $51.24 and US at $48.19.
*USA. Why? Could be “a million barrels per day of ultra-light U.S. crude” will be released soon. This may offset—somewhat—losses looming for producers as oil prices continue their descent. Nigeria will be hit hardest by this action.
File: Protesters against the Keystone XL pipeline in New York City on January 8, 2013. (Michael Fleshman / Flickr)
*USA. US Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) says the Democrats will be able to back President Obama if he vetoes the Keystone XL pipeline bill the Republicans have vowed to push through the Senate. He even noted Keystone will produce only 35 permanent jobs in the US, and wondered, why bother, when “you can create tens of thousands more clean jobs using wind and solar?”
*USA. US Steel plans to lay off 756 workers, citing a lull in demand for tubular piping, a result of the oil price decline.
*CA. Two new oil-related laws going into affect: 1) frackers have to report the amount of water used while drilling; 2) railroads have to notify the state of the volume of hazardous materials, including crude oil, and the routes being used to transport the stuff through CA.
*CO. It’s getting very ugly out there. Longmont residents voted against fracking in their community inn 2012. Now, “state officials, energy companies and industry groups are taking Longmont and other municipalities to court, forcing local governments into what critics say are expensive, long-shot efforts to defend the measures.” Citizens are even being accused of ripping off industry.
*DC. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell has chimed in, criticizing “local and state bans … [that] create confusion for the oil and natural gas industries.” Does she know Interior is supposed to protect US “natural resources and heritage” and honor “our cultures and tribal communities” as well as be concerned with energy supplies?
*DC. Demonstration at the White House, called by Native American leaders, in protest of the Keystone XL pipeline and asking President Obama to veto any bill that comes to his desk in favor of the pipeline. This Thursday, the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources is scheduled to markup the Keystone XL pipeline bill.
*KY. “Nearly 700 coal miners in Western Kentucky are feeling hopeful this week. Patriot Coal is negotiating sale of its Highland and Dodge Hill mines, which it permanently closed last week to Alliance Resource Partners of OK.
*LA. Limited victory, with the state denying Comstock Resources use of Amite River water in fracking, but approving use of “water from nearby ponds.”
*MI. 2,000 gallons of oil have gone into Lake Michigan “from a southwestern Michigan nuclear plant.” Assurances the oil “is not contaminated with radiation,” however.
*NC. Conservationists have filed a lawsuit, arguing that the state’s recently-issued fracking rules were the work of a panel that “was formed in violation of the state Constitution.”
Methane and other poisonous gases leak into the atmosphere, contributing to the major “Hot Spot” over Four Corners, NM. (Earthworks has several such videos here.)
*NM. News of the “major U.S. hot spot for methane emissions” in Four Corners, first noted last October, is finally getting attention. Satellites are observing methane “as it escapes from drilling rigs, compressors and a pipeline snaking across the badlands … [forming] a permanent methane cloud, so vast” that scientists simply couldn’t believe it at first look. It’s part of a $2 billion methane leak phenomenon. And methane is a powerful greenhouse gas. Somebody better alert Sally Jewell.
*OH. No earthquakes ever recorded in one part of eastern OH until the frackers moved in.
*PA. Forceful article opposing Sunoco Logistics’ proposed pipeline from eastern Ohio, West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania. Sunoco had two crude oil “spills” last year, 189,000 gallons near Shreveport and 20,000 more gallons in southwestern Ohio. “We are not a throwaway people … We shouldn’t have to risk an industry’s pollutants and toxins if we don’t want to.”
*SD. Yankton Sioux, other tribes, organizations and individuals are scheduled to attend the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission hearing today regarding the Keystone XL pipeline.
*TX. 18-wheeler hauling propane overturned and caught fire on I-20 in Arlington. Fearing an explosion, authorities closed the interstate and evacuated nearby residents.
*TX. Trouble brewing in San Angelo over the possibility of a facility for shipping fracking sand by rail.
*WV. For the second time, a chemical manufacturer has claimed that fracking near its Marshall County operation would have a negative impact on its operation. And for the second time, a judge denied the challenge.
*WV. Two members of the Board of Education won approval of including “climate change as controversy” rather than science in the schools. Concern that “‘West Virginia coal in particular has been taking on unfair negativity” added to the momentum.
*Canada. If oil keeps dropping in price, $12 billion in Canadian oil and gas projects could be deferred in this year alone, including 16+ oil sands projects.
FILE – This Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2014, file photo shows an Indian woman from Ecuador posing for a photo at the Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru. Low oil prices could paradoxically help the world reach an international agreement to fight global warming, Laurence Tubiana, Frances special representative for the 2015 climate conference in Paris said, laying out plans for a binding accord to stem greenhouse gas emissions. Her government will spend 11 months trying to cajole more than 190 countries into overcoming disagreements about acceptable greenhouse gas emissions and who should pay for them, and locking themselves into an accord. (AP Photo/Juan Karita, File)
*Ecuador. President Rafael Correa is participating “in the first summit of China and the 33-member community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). Correa wants to discuss mining with the Chinese.
*Chile. Barrick Gold (Toronto) ran afoul of the Superintendence for the Environment concerning the Pascua Lama gold-silver mine. Fines were imposed. A lower court seemed to revoke the $16 million fine, due to regulatory misfiguring, and ordered Barrick to halt its activity at the mine. Barrick sued but the Supreme Court refused he case, putting everything back in the lap of the Superintendence for the Environment which has some re-figuring to do.
*Libya. Weird: the Libyan Air Force “bombed a Greek-operated oil tanker chartered by Libya’s national oil company, killing two crew members.” Libya’s military said there was something “suspicious” about the ship, including its possibly hauling Islamist militants, which the oil company has denied.
Alexei Kudrin speaks during a news conference in Moscow, Russia, Monday, Dec. 22, 2014. Alexei Kudrin, Russias finance minister in 2000-2011, has predicted a major economic crisis in Russia next year even if the prices on oil, the backbone of the Russian economy, go up. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)
*Russia. As oil prices fall, will Russia cut back on military and social spending (largely pensions), each of which accounts for about 33% of the national budget?
*Solomon Islands. Unbelievable! St. Barbara’s Gold Ridge Mine’s tailings pond levels are rising to a “a looming disaster” level but government authorities “have yet to take any action.”
Crossposted from MyFDL.
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