Coal Mines, Wastewater Systems, Landfills to Report Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant, the largest of New York City's 14 wastewater treatment systems (Photo by Victoria Belanger)

Maybe we don’t need Congress to address climate change at all. The Supreme Court already re-emphasized the legal power of the EPA to regulate air and water quality. so they are moving ahead with what needs to be done.

WASHINGTON, DC (from ENS) – Four major categories of industrial facilities will have to report their emissions of climate-altering greenhouse gases under a final rule issued for public comment Monday by the U.S. EPA.

The rule will bring underground coal mines, industrial wastewater treatment systems, industrial waste landfills and magnesium production facilities under the national mandatory greenhouse gas reporting program.
Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant, the largest of New York City’s 14 wastewater treatment systems (Photo by Victoria Belanger)

Methane is the primary greenhouse gas emitted from coal mines, industrial wastewater treatment systems and industrial landfills and this gas is more than 20 times as potent at warming the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, the most prevalent greenhouse gas.

The main fluorinated greenhouse gas emitted from magnesium production is sulfur hexafluoride, which has a much greater warming potential than methane, and can stay in the atmosphere for thousands of years. Magnesium producers must also report emissions of other fluorinated gases such as the refrigerant gas HFC-134a and the fire suppressant gas FK 5-1-12, as well as emissions of carbon dioxide.

These four source categories will begin collecting emissions data on January 1, 2011, with the first annual reports submitted to EPA on March 31, 2012.

The EPA says that data from these sectors will provide a better understanding of greenhouse gas emissions and will help EPA and businesses develop effective policies and programs to reduce them, the agency said in a statement announcing the final rule.

Ethanol producers, food processors and suppliers of coal will not be required to report their greenhouse gas emissions at this time, the EPA has decided.

In a separate proposed rule, EPA is requesting public comment on which industry-related greenhouse gas information would be made publicly available and which would be considered confidential.

Under the Clean Air Act, all emission data are public. Some non-emission data, however, may be considered confidential, because it relates to specific information which, if made public, could harm a business’s competitiveness.

Examples of data considered confidential under this proposal include certain information reported by fossil fuel and industrial gas suppliers related to production quantities and raw materials.

EPA is committed to providing the public with as much information as possible while following the law.

The greenhouse gas reporting program requires suppliers of fossil fuels or industrial greenhouse gases and large direct emitters of greenhouse gases to report to EPA.

Collecting this data will allow businesses to track emissions and identify cost effective ways to reduce emissions. EPA is preparing to [...]

Climate change science is nothing new, but the level of hostility to the scientists and others who talk about it is. Decades ago, in 1969 no less, aides to President Nixon were warning him about climate change and what it would mean to national security.

Adviser Daniel Patrick Moynihan . . . urged the [Nixon] administration to initiate a worldwide system of monitoring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, decades before the issue of global warming came to the public’s attention.

There is widespread agreement that carbon dioxide content will rise 25 percent by 2000, Moynihan wrote in a September 1969 memo.  “This could increase the average temperature near the earth’s surface by 7 degrees Fahrenheit,” he wrote. “This in turn could raise the level of the sea by 10 feet. Goodbye New York. Goodbye Washington, for that matter.“

Moynihan was Nixon’s counselor for urban affairs from January 1969 — when Nixon began his presidency — to December 1970. He later served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations before New York voters elected him to the Senate.   Moynihan received a response in a January 26, 1970 memo from Hubert Heffner, deputy director of the administration’s Office of Science and Technology. Heffner acknowledged that atmospheric temperature rise was an issue that should be looked at.

They are still doing that, except now the Pentagon and others worried about coming wars for resources are also chiming in and trying to warn the President too. In directly correlation to this, the anti-science noise is growing louder. They are also trying to sabotage scientists in anyway they can. Remember the hacked emails?

Dr. Michael Mann

Happy Independence Day — now if we only had some independence from climate change deniers.  At least Michael Mann and his science graph known as the “hockey stick”  got final exoneration from Penn State.

“An Investigatory Committee of faculty members with impeccable credentials” has unanimously “determined that Dr. Michael E. Mann did not engage in, nor did he participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research, or other scholarly activities.”

Reported by CLIMATE PROGRESS and DemocracyNow.org

Penn State Panel Clears “Climategate” Scientist

An investigative panel at Pennsylvania State University has cleared a scientist linked to the so-called “Climategate” controversy last year. The scientist, Dr. Michael Mann, was among the authors of emails stolen from the computer system of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in Britain. Deniers of global warming had claimed the stolen emails provided evidence of an effort to silence academics who have questioned or downplayed human-driven climate change. In its probe, Penn State said it found no evidence Mann manipulated scientific findings on global warming.

And from Climate Progress, they point out that few [...]

The ship seen in the video above is called the A Whale, and it’s ready to suck up water and oil and separate them on board, as it was built to do. It’s no surprise to many that it’s sitting idle nearby in the water, while the government decides where to put it. It is massive, 3 football-fields long, and 10 stories high, and here’s what it can do. The ship was modified after the BP explosion to scoop up 21 million gallons of oily water per day. So why is it sitting around? Its sheer size. The place it would do the most good is where the oil is “fresh”, and that area is already over-crowded. So let’s move some boats around and get this thing operating. Is that rocket science?  Read more here.

Congress is not without ideas of its own. Rep. George Miller has come up with some interesting legislation.

Congressman George Miller will be introducing an amendment that would ban BP from offshore leases.  At this point, BP’s best bet would be to transition their money to researching how they can make those big profits from renewable energy.  Only then would they really deserve the title they have already been using, “Beyond Petroleum”.

BP Would Be Barred From Offshore Leases Under Bill

June 30 (Bloomberg) — BP Plc would be barred from new U.S. offshore oil and gas leases for as long as seven years under legislation being drafted by Representative George Miller, who cited the company’s safety and environmental violations.

BP “has a flagrant history of taking risks to boost profits that has resulted in deaths of workers, destruction of the environment and economic chaos in local communities,” Miller said today in an e-mailed statement. Miller plans to offer his bill as an amendment to legislation that would overhaul drilling rules.

President Barack Obama’s administration and lawmakers are considering penalties that would limit BP’s U.S. operations. In addition to BP’s Gulf spill, Miller cited a 2005 explosion at BP’s Texas City refinery that killed 15 workers and a 2006 pipeline leak that dumped 200,000 gallons of crude at Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, as reasons for his legislation.

“Serial violators ought to face consequences, and one of those consequences should be denying” BP and oil-producing companies “with this kind of record the right to drill in America’s offshore waters,” Miller said in the statement.

The U.S. also may revoke BP’s status as operator of producing wells in the Gulf, such as Thunder Horse, or of leases at Prudhoe Bay, David Pursell, a managing director at Tudor Pickering Holt & Co. LLC, a Houston investment bank, said this month. Congress also is weighing measures to bar BP from contracts with the Department of Defense and Environmental Protection Agency.

Administration [...]

Futurist Fashion Today

July 4, 2010
3:30pm
Fundacion Proa (Buenos Aires)

Winding down the exhibit The Universe of Futurism, this last weekend closes with the spectacular show Futurist Fashion Today. Fundación Proa has invited to the event Professor Andrea Saltzman (FADU-UBA), along with her Fashion Design course, to reflect on Futurist fashion. The product of this proposal is a fashion show with work from more than 400 students from the course’s first, second and third years.

The show Futurist Fashion Today works on the concept of movement and the revolutionary ideas set forth in the Futurist fashion manifesto, published in 1914. From a contemporary vision, this work, which focuses on historical material, actualizes and expands on the most significant aspects of fashion design and the relevance of body language. Fashion accompanies life; it serves as a document of an era.

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