First Amendment, Freedom of Religion, Freedom of Press, Freedom of Assembly and Petition, Climate Crisis, Some Truth, Discoveries, Strong Current Trilogy, Current Affairs Trilogy, Greg Olmsted Books, Environmental and Health Journalism
By GREG OLMSTED – On April 15, 2017, the Tax March on DC and throughout the United States was an outpouring of frustration and democracy. Trump said he wasn’t going to release his taxes because nobody wanted to see them. The people proved him wrong. Americans want to see Trump’s tax returns. Watch the march here.
By GREG OLMSTED – On January 21, 2017, the Women’s March on DC and around the world was an outpouring of energy and democracy. The march was a rebuke to Donald Trump the day after he became President. The Women’s March is one of the biggest political protests in US history. The march was much larger than President Trump’s Inaguration – by hundreds of thousands. Leading figures of women’s rights movement attending included Gloria Steinem, Cecile Richards and many others. Visit the Women’s March homepage for a complete list of more than two dozen presenters.
Watch Michael Moore’s speech on his Facebook Page or the CBS video here. He said to call your representatives at 202 – 225-3121 each day. Public outcry stopped Congress from shutting down the Office of Government and Congressional Ethics. Speak out against Donald Trump and take a more active role in local and national politics.
The Women’s March is just a beginning. Join groups. Join Planned Parenthood. Increase your donations to Planned Parenthood and environmental organizations.
By GREG OLMSTED – After a six-year effort Chevron finally sold their refinery on Oahu. It was probably a fire sale – you may remember that Tesoro sold their Hawaii refinery in 2013 for only $75 million cash and it was almost twice as large. Chevron started hemorrhaging last year (lost more than a half billion dollars in one quarter) and is furiously selling assets. Word in the industry is that they are slashing spending by 40 percent for each of the next two years. Ouch! Long story short: according to the Star-Advertiser, Island Energy Services LLC, a subsidiary of One Rock Capital Partners of New York, now owns a 58,000 barrels per day refinery, 58 gasoline stations (to be rebranded as Texaco, really?), and four fossil fuel distribution terminals (one on each main island) in Hawaii. That’s right, HAWAII.
Transporting crude to Hawaii for refining is a disaster waiting to happen. Read the first four chapters of my book Under Threat, A Strong Current Trilogy Book 3. Under Threat describes the dramatic effect of a catastrophic oil spill when a supertanker breaks it’s back off the coast of Waikiki after colliding with a longliner fishing vessel.
Before the sale, Chevron had promoted a future utility-scale solar photovoltaic project on Oahu that would produce 1 megawatt, displacing 10,000 barrels of oil per year. Will Island Energy Services continue that project? Any hope for the solar thermal demonstration project that Chevron had considered for the refinery?
By GREG OLMSTED
Fracking update: In my earlier blog (Fracking Earthquake Wakes Journalists, October 13, 2015), I described what it was like to wake up to tremors while sleeping in a nice hotel in Oklahoma. The earthquake was caused by hydro-fracking. On Monday, the USGS released maps showing new earthquake hazard areas. The map includes Norman, Oklahoma and the hotel where I was staying.
During the recent Environmental Film Festival in Washington DC “Dear President Obama: The Clean Energy Revolution is Now” premiered at the National Geographic Society. “Dear President Obama” is a documentary about the fracking industry and harm inflicted on Americans. To learn more about the film read the Huffington Post review and visit https://www.facebook.com/dearobamafilm. To take action visit Americans Against Fracking. And keep an eye out this fall for a screening of Dear President Obama film in a theater near you!
By GREG OLMSTED
Each morning I read the NY Times and the Washington Post, and then I refill my coffee and peruse my email. I always open my free subscription to The Daily Climate, knowing that the top climate news from around the world will be at my fingertips. I encourage you to subscribe, too. The folks at the Daily Climate do a wonderful job, reporting not only the top news stories but also solutions, consequences, and causes and politics — all relating to Climate Change. Today, they featured an interview by Judy Woodruff, PBS News Hour called “Has Exxon Mobile mislead the public about its climate change research?”
By GREG OLMSTED
Greenland, the world’s largest island, supports “one of the biggest and fastest-melting chunks of ice on earth,” according to an article in the New York Times. And it’s quickly melting away. The ice melts and forms lakes. The lakes feed rivers. The rivers flow into moulins or giant holes in the ice. And the sea level rises. Watch Josh Haner, a Pulitzer Prize winner in feature photography, drone along a beautiful, fast flowing river that vanishes into a moulin.
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Drone update: In my earlier blog (Breakfast with weather researchers and drones, October 17), I reported on the difference between hobby and commercial drones. Since then, Anthony Fox, U.S. Secretary of Transportation announced that the Department of Transportation will be “Having a national registry of folks who are owners of drones and users of drones.” Drone owners and users be advised: According to Mr. Fox, the Federal Drone Registry will include retro-active registration, too. In fact, the control of drones is being fast-tracked: a task force will make recommendations before Thanksgiving and the federal government will require registration before Christmas sales of drones. This is a major undertaking. Both Amazon Prime Air and Google X’s drone delivery programs/businesses are task force members, along with Best Buy and Walmart. But who is representing journalists and videographers? In addition to the registration requirement, the FAA is working with CACI to develop a program that will track use of drones near airports and identify their owners.
By GREG OLMSTED
“Global sea level has risen about eight inches since reliable record keeping began in 1880. Best projections are that it may rise another 1 to 4 feet by the end of the current century. What does that translate into? If we continue on that path, by mid-century, by 2050, between 66 and 106 billion dollars worth of coastal property – existing coastal property – will likely be below sea level, nation wide. Big numbers.” — Kathryn Sullivan, NOAA Administrator, NOAA Administrator and Under Secretary of Commerce of Oceans and Atmosphere, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
By GREG OLMSTED
“Please give us something optimistic to take away, here,” Seth Borenstein, the moderator asked his panel. “Something a little … less pessimistic than we have been hearing.” Berrien Moore, the Director of the National Weather Center replied, “There are tipping points politically. And I point only to the Tobacco case. For how many years were we told, ‘Oh no, there is no health risk.’ And then finally the body politic said, ‘That is just idiotic. Clearly there is a health risk.’ And it switched.”
Well, the switch has occurred among Americans, including the majority of Republicans, too. Survey results by the University of Texas show that three quarters (75%) of Americans accept the science of climate change. Similarly, the National Surveys on Energy and Environment results show that seventy percent of Americans believe in climate change.
But what of the body politic? When will the body politic switch, too?
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Seth Borenstein and Berrien Moore, question and answer, recorded at the Opening Plenary, Climate Change and Extreme Weather: Planning for an Uncertain Future, October 9, 2015, Society of Environmental Journalists 25th Annual Conference, Norman, Oklahoma, by Greg Olmsted. From left to right: Kathleen Tierney (Director, Natural Hazards Center and Professor, Department of Sociology and the Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado, Boulder), Berrien Moore (Director, National Weather Center; Dean, College of Atmospheric & Geographic Sciences; Chesapeake Energy Corporation Chair in Climate Studies; and Vice President, Weather & Climate Programs, University of Oklahoma), Seth Borenstein (Science Writer, The Associated Press; moderator), Kathryn Sullivan (NOAA Administrator and Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), Jonathan Overpeck (Thomas R. Brown Distinguished Professor, Regents’ Professor of Geosciences and Atmospheric Sciences, and Co-Director, Institute of the Environment, University of Arizona).
By GREG OLMSTED
A 4.4 magnitude earthquake woke guests at the Embassy Suites by Hilton in Norman, Oklahoma last Saturday. Ironically, many hotel guests, including myself, were members of the Society of Environmental Journalists. We were attending SEJ’s 25th Annual Conference, focusing on Weather, Water, Energy: News in Every Neighborhood. The earthquake made for lively conversation during our continental breakfast.
More than two years ago, Joe Wertz, a StateImpact reporter, explained How Disposal Wells Might Cause Earthquakes. Earlier this year, NPR StateImpact documented the nexus between fracking in Oklahoma and earthquakes. And last Saturday, Seth Borenstein, an AP Science Writer, reported the details of the earthquake that we experienced. And tomorrow … ?
Dirty Business Publishing 