CBC: Bringing Coal Back

Mountain top removed coal mine

The CBC article states, “On June 1, the United Conservative government of Premier Jason Kenney rescinded the coal policy. The full implications of this are not yet clear, but there is growing tension — both nervous and excited energy — about what it will bring.

“What is known is that the change happened suddenly, with virtually no public consultation but plenty of behind-the-scenes lobbying. And it didn’t happen in isolation. It came alongside a rapid-fire series of legislative changes that removed hurdles or industrial development, more broadly, during a particularly desperate economic moment.”

The word “mine” evokes images of soot-smeared workers in underground tunnels, but this is actually a mountain in the process of being deconstructed. A geologic wound. Its slopes are blackened and tiered, abuzz with enormous yellow trucks that look tiny from this distance, kicking up grey plumes of dust as they haul the pulverized mountain away, load by load.

The CBC wrote an article about the Grassy Mountain Coal Project today. Likewise, so did I. If you have an interest in Alberta environmental issues, you can click here to read the CBC article and click here to read mine.

This entry was posted in General and tagged alberta, Australia, emissions, fossil fuels, UCP on July 7, 2020 by Steve.

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Climate change will help more diseases like COVID-19 jump from animals to humans, UN experts say | CBC News

In the last hundred years, the world has seen massive increases in human populations, resulting in massive decreases in natural environments. These two parallel trends are critical parts of the complex chain of events that has triggered a rise in the emergence and spread of new zoonoses.

Zoonotic diseases(also known as zoonoses) are illnesses that are caused by germs that spread between animals and people. Examples of zoonoses include HIV/AIDS, Ebola, Lyme disease, malaria, rabies, West Nile virus, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome(MERS), in addition to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19)

July 7, 2020

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Northern fish are tough, but climate change is causing some to dwindle

Our research team set out to see how stream fishes were responding to unprecedented environmental changes across their northern ranges. Ultimately, we wanted to know how these changes might affect the hundreds of thousands of people in Alaska and northern Canada that rely on local fisheries for food, culture and economic security.

Initially, we were surprised to learn that warming was increasing the distribution of cold-adapted fish. We reasoned that modest amounts of warming could lead to benefits such as increased food and winter habitat availability without reaching stressful levels for many species.

Yet, not all fish species fared equally well. Ecologically unique northern species — those that have evolved in colder, more nutrient-poor environments, such as Arctic grayling and Dolly Varden trout — were showing declines with warming.

July 7, 2020

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Judge orders Dakota Access pipeline shut down pending review

U.S.
District Judge James Boasberg said in April that the pipeline, which
has been in operation three years, remains “highly controversial” under
federal environmental law, and a more extensive review is necessary than
the environmental assessment that was done. In a 24-page order Monday,
Boasberg wrote that he was “mindful of the disruption such a shutdown
will cause,” but said he had concluded that the pipeline must be shut
down.

July 6, 2020

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Global Oil Demand, CO2 Emissions Likely Peaked in 2019 as Fossil Analysts Predict More Stranded Assets – The Energy Mix

The follow-ups come after colossal fossils BP and Shell downgraded the value of their combined assets by as much as US$39.5 billion over the last couple of weeks.

“While we expect oil demand to recover next year, we think that it’s likely that it will never reach the levels seen in 2019,” Sverre Alvik, head of DNV GL’s Energy Transition Outlook, told Reuters. While the reductions would not be enough to bring fossil emissions in line with the goals in the 2015 Paris Agreement, “COVID-19 has shown that behavioural changes are indeed possible, and we can use this opportunity to make a change which is good for climate,” he added.

July 6, 2020

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Steve MacLellan

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CBC: Bringing Coal Back