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newsclips -- Newsclips for May 23, 2014
Posted: 23 May 2014 13:16:19
ARB Newsclips for May 23, 2014. This is a service of the California Air Resources Board’s Office of Communications. You may need to sign in or register with individual websites to view some of the following news articles. CAP AND TRADE China's ambitious cap-and-trade plan rolls down a long, bumpy runway. China has made progress in its carbon trading pilot programs but still has a long way to go, government officials and industry players believe. China, the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, is betting on carbon trading as a key measure to cut its emissions for each unit of economic output 40 to 45 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060000102/print BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY AIR POLLUTION Claims Exide Battery Recycling Plant Has Repeatedly Violated Lead Emission Standards. Officials announced Thursday that the Exide battery recycling plant in Vernon has emitted risky levels of lead into the air, violating federal limits and endangering nearby residents’ health. Exide could face penalties of $37,500 per day for each violation, according to the EPA. Posted. http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2014/05/22/report-exide-battery-recycling-plant-has-repeatedly-violated-lead-emission-standards/ Air pollution is a $1.7T health problem, OECD finds. Air pollution is costing the world's most advanced economies plus India and China $3.5 trillion per year in lives lost and ill health, with a significant amount of the burden stemming from vehicle tailpipes, according to a new report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Posted. http://www.eenews.net/stories/1060000041 CLIMATE CHANGE Australia’s Pollution U-Turn Threatening UN Climate Talks. Australia’s program to rein in pollution is losing momentum, the latest in a series of setbacks for the international effort to tackle global warming. With the highest per-capita fossil fuel emissions among industrial countries, Australia’s participation in United Nations-led climate talks is seen as crucial to sway China and India to step up pollution controls even as developed nations backslide. Posted. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-22/australia-s-pollution-u-turn-threatening-un-climate-talks.html Air Resources Board shows off mobile pollution monitoring technology. Tasked with monitoring and reducing vehicle emissions, among other things, California Air Resources Board showed off some of the mobile technology it uses to measure pollution. Posted. http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/news/2014/05/22/air-resources-board-shows-off-mobile-pollution.html Study Finds Regulations Could Be Improving Sacramento’s Terrible Air Quality Rating. The American Lung Association ranks Sacramento as having the fifth-worst air quality in the nation, but new testing reveals that ranking may soon begin to fall, meaning possible big savings for the state. From the outside, the Toyota Rav4 doesn’t look like much, but inside is $300,000 worth of pollution testing equipment. Posted. http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2014/05/22/study-finds-regulations-could-be-improving-sacramentos-terrible-air-quality-rating/ Lawmakers Called Upon to Make More Definitive Climate Rules Beyond 2020. As the California Air Resources Board (CARB) hears public comment Thursday on a far-reaching plan to meet the greenhouse gas reduction goals in the Golden State's clean energy law (AB 32), business groups are calling on lawmakers to make more definitive plans beyond 2020. Posted. http://www.azocleantech.com/news.aspx?newsID=20182 Air quality at Culver City school under study. In its ongoing efforts to improve the air quality around El Marino Language School, the Culver City Unified School District recently installed a donated heating and air conditioning system in the classroom that is closest to the San Diego (405) Freeway, which is literally across the street from the school. Posted. http://wavenewspapers.com/news/local/culver_city_edition/article_62e4e7a8-e201-11e3-a7ef-001a4bcf6878.html Managers see freshwater shortages as part of a new normal for changed climate. Forty out of 50 state water managers expect freshwater shortages in their states "under average conditions" in the next decade, and a growing number are expressing concerns about climate effects on water infrastructure, according to a new government report released yesterday. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060000131/print BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY Study says carbon loss from tropical forests 'underestimated' A new study suggests that "hidden" emissions from tropical forests mean their amount of carbon lost is being significantly undercounted. Selective logging and fires, almost invisible to satellite observations, are causing extensive emissions in tropical forests. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060000101/print BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY DROUGHT Drought has upside: record-low rainfall means cleaner beach water. California's drought has at least one upside: Record-low rainfall has resulted in cleaner water up and down the coast, a new report says. Ninety-five percent of California beaches earned A or B grades for water quality during the summer of 2013, a 2% improvement over the previous year, according to the annual Beach Report Card released Thursday by Heal the Bay, an environmental group. Posted. http://www.latimes.com/science/la-me-adv-beach-report-20140523-story.html Drought's upside? Better water quality at beaches, report says. There’s at least one upside to the drought: Record-low rainfall has resulted in cleaner water up and down the California coast, a new report says. Posted. http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-beach-report-card-drought-boosts-grades-20140522-story.html Feinstein's California drought bill passes Senate. Sen. Dianne Feinstein won unanimous Senate approval of a drought bill Thursday, setting up a potential compromise with House Republicans who have passed legislation that would override endangered-species protections to send more water to farms and cities. Posted. http://www.sfgate.com/default/article/Feinstein-s-California-drought-bill-passes-Senate-5499655.php http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/05/22/228255/senate-passes-california-drought.html#storylink=cpy DIESEL EMISSIONS Company racing to clean up ship pollution in ports. One day last week, Clean Air Engineering-Maritime Inc. pulled a barge alongside a container ship in the Port of Los Angeles. A 130-foot-tall tower with a boom attached was slowly swung out over the hulking ship hauling thousands of containers. Posted. http://www.ocregister.com/articles/air-615384-clean-ship.html Children breathe easier as new regs, technologies clean up school buses. Those big yellow buses ubiquitous on school-day mornings and afternoons are getting vastly cleaner as schools and bus companies adapt to new tough pollution regulations and launch diesel-free vehicles. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/stories/1060000152/ BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY VEHICLES Forget Saving the Planet, Driving an Electric Car Will Save Your Life. The failure to persuade a sizeable percentage of Americans that climate change poses a clear and present danger is one of the great failures in marketing and the subject of considerable debate among scientists, academics and politicians. But there is one argument for taking action against global warming that has resonated: health. Posted. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/05/forget-saving-the-planet-driving-an-electric-car-will-save-your-life/371533/ OECD: rising air pollution-related deaths taking heavy toll on society; more should be done to reduce transport emissions. Outdoor air pollution kills some 3.5 million people across the world every year, and causes health problems from asthma to heart disease for many more, according to data collected by the World Health Organization (WHO). (Earlier post.) This pollution is costing advanced economies plus China and India an estimated US$3.5 trillion a year in premature deaths and ill health…Posted. http://www.greencarcongress.com/2014/05/20140523-oecd.html GREEN ENERGY Generous rooftop solar credit far from over. The end may still be years away for a generous utility bill credit for rooftop solar customers in the San Diego area. Customers of San Diego Gas & Electric have yet to reach the halfway mark toward a cap on the current system of “net energy metering” credits for rooftop solar energy, according to the utility. Posted. http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/may/22/net-metering-still-open/ Big battery at Stanislaus-Merced line called a game changer in solar-energy storage. In the middle of a remote almond orchard near the Stanislaus-Merced county border, a revolutionary “battery” was unveiled Thursday. Energy experts are calling it a game changer that will help stabilize California’s electrical grid. It’s the world’s largest iron-chromium redox flow battery, and it can store the electrical power generated by the adjoining photovoltaic solar panel array. Posted. http://www.modbee.com/2014/05/22/3352691/big-battery-at-stanislaus-merced.html?sp=/99/1571/&ihp=1#storylink=cpy UC Riverside center to focus on renewable energy research. UC Riverside officials have launched a $12 million facility to identify and research the integration of renewable energy technologies with energy storage and vehicles that hook into the grid. “The project has implications for the nation and the world,” said Reza Abbaschian, dean of the Bourns College of Engineering, during a ceremony Wednesday beneath photovoltaic panels. Posted. http://www.sbsun.com/environment-and-nature/20140522/uc-riverside-center-to-focus-on-renewable-energy-research For the first time, hydropower accounts for less than 50% of U.S. renewable energy. Solar and wind power may be leading the growth of renewables in the United States today, but it has long been an older source of energy -- hydropower -- that has dominated the renewable energy sector. Built for the most part decades before climate change entered the popular lexicon, hydroelectric has continued to supply the majority of the country's clean, renewable energy, even as other power sources raced forward. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060000132/print BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY First grid-scale battery of its kind unveiled at Calif. Farm. In the middle of an almond grove near here, in California's Central Valley, a first-of-its-kind battery is sharing space with nut trees, solar panels and irrigation equipment. The 1-megawatt system, which holds four hours of power, is the first large-scale example of an iron-chromium flow battery. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060000134/print BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY MISCELLANEOUS Sacramento’s Mather Airport in long-shot bid for Tesla’s big factory. It would be among the biggest economic development bonanzas Sacramento has seen in years, courtesy of one of the most glamorous companies around. But the odds are very long. Wading into a fierce multistate competition, Mather Airport’s business park is in the running for the massive battery factory planned by Tesla Motors Inc. Posted. http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/22/6425105/sacramentos-mather-airport-in.html#mi_rss=Our%20Region#storylink=cpy Designing a bigger, greener home amid trees. The sylvan beauty and funky charm of Santa Monica's Rustic Canyon cast its spell on Jill Soffer a dozen years ago. She liked the neighborhood's relaxed environment and abundance of sycamore trees. She purchased a home there in 2002. "There's all this green around. It's not too manicured," Soffer says appreciatively…Posted. http://www.contracostatimes.com/News/ci_25778882/Designing-a-bigger-greener-home-amid Local community meeting set on high-speed rail. A community meeting to discuss the proposed California high-speed rail system is scheduled for Thursday, June 5 in Newhall. It is one of five meetings being conducted by the California High-Speed Rail Authority to discuss the route for the Palmdale to Los Angeles project section, which includes potential routes through the Santa Clarita Valley. Posted. http://www.signalscv.com/section/36/article/120286/ OPINIONS Gavin Schmidt on Why Climate Models are Wrong, and Valuable. I’m overdue to draw your attention to two fresh, and very different, discussions of climate science by Gavin Schmidt, the longtime climate modeler at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. First is his conversation with Perrin Ireland, a science illustrator with a playful touch at the Natural Resources Defense Council. Posted. http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/05/22/gavin-schmidt-on-why-climate-models-are-wrong-and-valuable/?action=click&module=Search®ion=searchResults&mabReward=relbias%3Ar&url=http%3A%2F%2Fquery.nytimes.com%2Fsearch%2Fsitesearch%2F%3Faction%3Dclick%26region%3DMasthead%26pgtype%3DHomepage%26module%3DSearchSubmit%26contentCollection%3DHomepage%26t%3Dqry651%23%2Fclimate%2Bchange%2F24hours%2F Natural Gas Race. “Russia and China Finally Complete 30-Year Gas Deal” (front page, May 22): The Cold War of the 1940s and ’50s set off an arms race. The United States’ new cold war against Russia has set off a natural gas race. That Russia is turning to China as a major natural gas customer is hardly surprising, but it is dismaying given the extent of climate change across the planet, which is sure to worsen if fossil fuel use continues at its current levels. Posted. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/23/opinion/natural-gas-race.html?action=click&module=Search®ion=searchResults&mabReward=relbias%3Ar&url=http%3A%2F%2Fquery.nytimes.com%2Fsearch%2Fsitesearch%2F%3Faction%3Dclick%26region%3DMasthead%26pgtype%3DHomepage%26module%3DSearchSubmit%26contentCollection%3DHomepage%26t%3Dqry651%23%2Fclimate%2Bchange%2F24hours%2F&_r=0 Dan Walters: ‘Cap-and-trade’ fee spending looms as major conflict. Spending a growing pot of money from “cap-and-trade” fees on businesses that emit greenhouse gases looms as a major conflict between Gov. Jerry Brown and legislators as they wrangle over the 2014-15 budget. Posted. http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/22/6426400/dan-walters-cap-and-trade-fee.html BLOGS Why Electric Vehicles Will Rule the Road. I’m not generally a fan of picking winners and losers except when it comes to the future of cars. Here, electric vehicles (EVs) are the clear long-term winners. They’re highly efficient, dirt cheap to power, and can run on infrastructure that already exists. And even though electricity isn’t yet “clean” in many places around the country, EVs still generate fewer emissions than your average gas-powered vehicle—regardless of whether you charge up on the coal-fired Kentucky grid or Washington’s much cleaner hydro- and wind- powered system. Posted. http://blogs.wsj.com/experts/2014/05/20/why-electric-vehicles-will-rule-the-road/ How (not) to talk about climate change. Last week, John Oliver’s skit on climate change went viral. In it he proclaimed: “That [people's beliefs about climate change] doesn’t matter. You don’t need people’s opinion on a fact. You might as well have a poll asking which number is bigger, 15 or 5. … The debate on climate change should not be whether or it exists, it’s what we should do about it. There is a mountain of research on this topic.” Posted. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2014/05/22/how-not-to-communicate-uncertainty-about-climate-change/ CARB’s Special Toyota RAV4 EV Collects Air Pollution Data. With so many automakers delivering their first batch of green cars to California, you can easily say the state is like a Mecca of clean driving, if you neglect some areas in Japan, like Toyota City for example. Thing is, California is the place of choice for automakers to test out their newest technology in green matter and two of the greatest eco vehicles were born/made popular in the area - the Toyota Prius and Tesla Model S. Posted. http://www.autoevolution.com/news/carbs-special-toyota-rav4-ev-collects-air-pollution-data-81675.html CARB uses tricked-out RAV4 EV to measure air pollution in California. The old-school Toyota RAV4 EV you see above is the California Air Resources Board's version of a non-participant observer. The all-electric vehicle cruises around the state measuring airborne pollution. Since it's powered by batteries, there are no tailpipe emissions created as CARB tries to get a handle on how dirty the roadway air is. Posted. http://green.autoblog.com/2014/05/22/carb-uses-tricked-out-rav4-ev-to-measure-air-pollution/ As of today, Nissan has sold 50,000 Leafs in the US, 115,000 globally. Watch out, America, there are 50,000 Nissan Leaf electric vehicles prowling your streets. That's the official word from Nissan, which says it has just delivered the 50,000th Leaf – a black SL model – to Todd and Lisa Bolt in Dallas, Texas. Todd is a pastor at the Gateway Church in Southlake, where there almost two dozen Leaf drivers who call themselves the "Blessed LEAFs Club." We're not making that up. Posted. http://green.autoblog.com/2014/05/23/nissan-sold-50000-leafs-in-us-115000-globally/ Is Subsidizing the Purchase of Electric Cars the Best Way to Reduce Air Pollution? The purpose of this article is to show with relatively simple logic that electric cars will not have a noticeable impact on air quality and so it is a complete waste of money to subsidize these cars. Let's start with the objective of not only electrification but also of other alternative fuels: reduce emissions, so as to improve the air quality. Posted. http://www.evworld.com/news.cfm?newsid=33152 California is in a drought emergency. Visit www.SaveOurH2O.org for water conservation tips.