Category Archives: Environment

The Gazprom Case: Good Timing or Bad Timing?

Just a week after having sent a Statement of Objections (SO) in the frame of the antitrust case against Google, EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager sent yesterday an SO in the frame of the case against Gazprom. The decision to send a charge sheet against the Russian gas company came after almost three years of investigations, which have also seen EU antitrust officials raiding Gazprom offices in central and eastern European countries.

California Urban Water Use Restricted While Regulators Give Oil Industry Two More Years To Operate Injection Wells In Protected Groundwater Aquifers

The Department of Oil, Gas, and Geothermal Resources has improperly permitted as many as 2,500 injection wells in groundwater aquifers.

The Gulf of Maine: Poster Child for Global Weirding?

Who believes the Gulf of Maine is warming, and reasons to believe that it is.

Fracking’s New Nemesis: Earthquake Lawsuits

Despite widespread environmental concerns and community opposition, in large swathes of the US, the fracking industrial complex has seemed unstoppable. That may finally be changing.

Fracking Industry Conspiring To Cover Up Oklahoma Earthquake Evidence?

It’s one thing to suspect that evidence that fracking causes earthquakes is being suppressed. It’s quite another to be able to name the parties behind the cover up.

The Obama Administration, Shell, and the Fate of the Arctic Ocean

Royal Dutch Shell wants to drill in the Chukchi Sea this summer and that could, in the long term, spell doom for one of the last great, relatively untouched oceanic environments on the planet.

The Cost of Delaying Action to Stem Climate Change

The cost of delaying climate action has been studied extensively. A one-decade delay in addressing climate change would lead to about a 40% increase in the net present value cost of addressing climate change.

Is All Growth Good? The Case of China

Growth versus “groaf” had become a favorite topic of the NC commentariat. This article sets forth some of the ways for differentiating between them, using China as an example.

Green Growth or No Growth?

Many readers have taken the position that we need to put a brake on growth in order to cut greenhouse gas emissions and reduce consumption of other resources.

In a Real News Network interview, Robert Pollin goes through the math of carbon output and shows why a no growth approach is inadequate.

Michael Klare: How Big Oil Is Responding to the Anti-Carbon Movement

Yves here. It should be no surprise that Big Oil is not about to go down without a big fight. And they continue to copy from the playbook used by Big Tobacco. Behind the scenes, they go to great lengths to trying to undermine the already strong and ever-increasing evidence of the connection between greenhouse gas emissions and climate change, including openly offering bribes to scientists to attack the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports. In addition, frontally, they try to present their products and their social role as positive.

Despite Current Glut, Oil Producers Continue Game of Chicken

When the world gives you too much oil, drill for more.

The Real Cause Of Low Oil Prices: Interview With Arthur Berman

Yves here. This is a terrific interview that you need to read pronto if you have any interest in the outlook for oil prices, understanding fracking economics, and the real reason for the push for Keystone XL pipeline. Berman is colorful, direct, and provides lots of granular detail.

Bill Moyers’ Last Show: Our Children’s Trust Climate Litigation

Yves here. We will all miss Bill Moyers, who in an important act of public service came out of retirement twice at viewer request. I was lucky enough to appear on his show twice. Bill is both a gentleman and a true pro, and went to great lengths to make his interviewees look good. His […]

Obama Administration Muzzling Its Climate Scientists

Yves here. The fact that Team Obama is gagging its climate scientists should come as no surprise. First, the Administration is obsesses with secrecy and image-management, as its extremely aggressive posture on classifying records and prosecuting leakers attests. Second, Administration climate policy is founded on a Big Lie. As Gaius Publius has written at length, its greenhouse gas measures exclude methane, the most potent greenhouse gas. That omission favors fracking, which fails the “clean green” test when you factor in methane releases. And that’s before you factor in contamination of water supplies.