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newsclips -- Newsclips for March 30, 2012
Posted: 30 Mar 2012 16:15:19
ARB Newsclips for March 30, 2012 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. AIR POLLUTION Bay Area Air District offers $10 million to reduce marine engine pollution. Bay Area commercial boat owners may qualify for state-funded grants and loans to help them replace their older, polluting diesel engines. According to the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, the district is offering $10 million in grants for commercial marine engine replacements. Grants to cover up to 80 percent of the replacement costs are available. Posted. http://www.timesheraldonline.com/news/ci_20288858/bay-area-air-district-offers-10-million-reduce Appeals board upholds Navajo permitting authority. An environmental appeals board has upheld the Navajo Nation's authority to regulate major sources of air pollution on the reservation. The Navajo Nation was the first tribe to be delegated authority by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to administer an air permits program that covers 14 sources on the reservation, including power plants. The tribe issued a permit in 2009 that set limits for particulate emissions for Peabody Western Coal Company's operations. But the company objected to citations of tribal law in the initial permit and a revised one, saying the permit essentially was identical to one issued by the EPA. Posted. http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_20282805/appeals-board-upholds-navajo-permitting-authority?IADID=Search-www.contracostatimes.com-www.contracostatimes.com NY landowners plan to frack using liquid propane. An upstate New York landowners group may partner with a Canadian company that uses liquid propane instead of controversial water-based hydraulic fracturing to get natural gas flowing into wells. Chris Denton, the attorney representing the 2,000-member Tioga County Landowners Association, said Thursday that leaders of the group have reached a deal with Calgary-based GasFrac, which has used liquefied propane gas to frack wells in Canada, Texas and Colorado. Posted. http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_20281807/ny-landowners-plan-frack-using-liquid-propane?IADID=Search-www.contracostatimes.com-www.contracostatimes.com Students sickened after pesticide drifts over bus. A day after a school bus was hit with pesticide drift, classes were back to normal Friday with only two of the 30 students who were aboard the bus missing from school. But Rio Bravo-Greeley Union School District Superintendent Ernie Unruh said it's his understanding that their absence had nothing to do with Thursday's incident. Hall paramedic Shane Courtis checks on one of many Rio Bravo-Greeley students who were impacted by an early morning pesticide drift that hit their school bus Thursday. Posted. http://www.bakersfieldcalifornian.com/local/x1282766286/Students-sickened-after-school-bus-sprayed-with-pesticide CLIMATE CHANGE IETA comments on citizens climate lobby suit against offsets in California. Henry Derwent, President and CEO of the International Emissions Trading Association, today commented on the lawsuit filed by Citizens Climate Lobby and Our Children's Earth against the California Air Resource Board's regulations allowing companies to use offsets to meet up to 8% of their compliance needs. "Offsets are a proven method for protecting the environment while at the same time keeping costs down," said Henry Derwent. "In these difficult economic times, when concern about energy costs is already high, it's difficult to understand why anyone would want to make it more difficult--and more expensive--to combat climate change, but that's exactly what this lawsuit would do…Posted. http://www.ieta.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=505:ieta-comments-on-citizens-climate-lobby-suit-against-offsets-in-california&catid=20:press-releases&Itemid=88 Scientists: 'No silver bullet' to declining Delta. There is no single cause for the deterioration of the Delta, a team of independent scientists said Thursday in a long-awaited report that fails to resolve one of the largest areas of controversy. The report by a committee of the National Academy of Sciences marks the end of a two-year investigation launched during the state's most recent drought. Congress and the federal government asked the influential academy - a kind of "Supreme Court" of science, although its findings are not legally enforceable - to study the Delta and California water as a whole. Posted. http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120330/A_NEWS14/203300314&cid=sitesearch VEHICLES Obama signs stop-gap transportation bill. President Barack Obama has signed a three-month extension of a transportation bill to keep federal highway and transit aid flowing. The move prevents a widespread shutdown of construction projects. The White House says Obama signed the 90-day extension before departing for Vermont Friday. The government's authority to spend money on transportation programs and levy federal fuel taxes was set to expire on Saturday. Posted. http://www.fresnobee.com/2012/03/30/2781630/obama-signs-stop-gap-transportation.html#storylink=misearch http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/obama-signs-three-month-extension-of-transportation-bill/2012/03/30/gIQADdpMlS_story.html EVI launches 500 electric medium-duty truck deployment initiative in California. Electric Vehicles International is launching a new initiative to deploy 500 fully electric return-to-base medium-duty delivery trucks in California. With the partnership and support of agencies such as the California Energy Commission, the California Air Resources Board, South Coast Air Quality Management District, San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District, and the Sacramento Air Quality Management District, EVI and UPS will jumpstart implementation of California Governor Brown’s EV Executive early this summer by deploying 100 medium-duty electric vehicles. Posted. http://www.greencarcongress.com/2012/03/evi-20120329.html GREEN ENERGY Germany Cuts Solar Aid to Curb Prices, Panel Installations. Germany’s parliament approved record cuts in aid for solar power, aiming to reduce the annual pace of installations by half in the world’s biggest market for the industry. Subsidies will be cut by as much as 29 percent starting April 1, depending on the size of the solar plant, according to the legislation posted on the parliament’s website. The measure passed by 305 votes to 235 on the strength of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition majority. Posted. http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-03-29/germany-cuts-solar-aid-to-curb-prices-panel-installations Offshore wind supporters to discuss benefits of developing turbines. Supporters of offshore wind will be highlighting its benefits as the House of Delegates nears a vote on a measure to develop it in Maryland. A coalition of supporters is scheduled to talk on Friday about how the measure could help minority-owned businesses in the state. They also will be discussing health benefits they say will result from reducing air pollution.The House of Delegates could vote on the bill as soon as Friday. Posted. http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/offshore-wind-supporters-to-discuss-benefits-of-developing-turbines/2012/03/30/gIQABlFNkS_story.html OPINIONS Old Power Plants Need New Rules. THE Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal earlier this week to reduce greenhouse gases from new power plants was hailed by many environmentalists, but unless steps are taken quickly to bring existing plants under the rule, it will create a perverse incentive for companies to keep running older, more heavily polluting power plants. That’s bad economics that could lead to dirtier air. The proposal would regulate carbon emissions from future power plants but leave existing sources untouched. This is yet another instance in a more than 40-year pattern under the Clean Air Act in which old and outdated technology has avoided new environmental standards. The result is continuing unhealthy levels of pollution. Posted. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/29/opinion/old-power-plants-need-new-rules.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=air%20pollution&st=cse 2nd revolution of oil waiting in our back yard. The world was reinvented in the 1970s by soaring oil prices and massive transfers of national wealth. It could be again if the price of petroleum crashes — a real possibility given the amazing estimates about the new gas and oil reserves on the North American continent. The Canadian tar sands, deepwater exploration in the Gulf of Mexico, horizontal drilling off the eastern and western American coastlines, fracking in once-untapped sites in North Dakota, and new pipelines from Alaska and Canada could within a decade double North American gas and oil production. Posted. http://www.modbee.com/2012/03/29/2135548/2nd-revolution-of-oil-waiting.html Southern California leaders get things done. The about-to-be-adopted 25-year Regional Transportation Plan for Southern California is a departure from convention with its emphasis on transit, walking and biking, and on multifamily housing instead of single-family homes. This could be good news for the Inland Empire, where reliance on the automobile has made residents especially vulnerable to traffic congestion, air pollution and rising gas prices, and where almost half the homes carrying mortgages were underwater last year - meaning that homeowners who sold them would not be able to pay off their loans. Posted. http://www.dailybulletin.com/ci_20290671/southern-california-leaders-get-things-done?IADID=Search-www.dailybulletin.com-www.dailybulletin.com PATTERSON: Obama kills coal - as promised. Well, we can’t say we weren’t warned. This week, the unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats at the Environmental Protection Agency released a set of proposed rules designed to target greenhouse gas emissions. If enacted, these rules would virtually destroy the coal industry - just as President Obama once promised he would do. Under the proposed rules, new power plants will be required to emit no more than 1,000 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour of electricity; coal plants average 1,768 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt. Posted. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/mar/29/obama-kills-coal-as-promised/ BLOGS Making Sense of the Wacky Weather. Like many people, I’ve been struggling to understand what is going on with the weather. As I flipped on my air conditioner one day in the middle of March to cool down an unbearably hot apartment, I thought, this is just weird. In recent years, we have lived through one weather extreme after another, sometimes whipsawing between them rather quickly. So, for my recent article on this topic, reported with Joanna Foster, I tried an interesting little exercise. Posted. http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/30/making-sense-of-the-wacky-weather/?pagemode=print Oil war: the ad battle between ‘Big Oil’ and DNC, Part 1. The pro-oil American Energy Alliance and the Democratic National Committee exchanged barbs this week over the president’s energy policies, providing a preview of the hard-hitting rhetorical campaigns and rapid-response reactions that will take place as the general election nears. AEA claimed that it will spend $3.6 million airing the 30-second advertisement in eight states “in the largest effort of its kind in AEA’s history.” We’ll examine these ads in the order they were released, looking at the American Energy Alliance commercial first and moving to the DNC video in a later column. Posted. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/oil-war-the-ad-battle-between-big-oil-and-dnc-part-1/2012/03/30/gIQA9yQZlS_blog.html