What could possibly go wrong?

Times:

GRAND ISLE, La. (AP) -- An offshore petroleum platform exploded and was burning Thursday in the Gulf of Mexico about 80 miles off the Louisiana coast, west of the site where BP's undersea well spilled after a rig explosion.

UPDATE: ThinkProgress notes:

A Coast Guard spokesperson said the platform, Vermilion Oil Rig 360, is an oil and gas platform in 2,500 feet of water and is owned by Houston-based Mariner Energy.

. . .

Just yesterday, however, the Financial Times reported that employees from Apache and Mariner, along with thousands of oil industry workers, rallied in Houston to protest the Obama administration’s offshore drilling moratorium that was designed as a safety precaution after BP’s disastrous Gulf oil spill. A Mariner Energy employee chastised the Obama administration for its drilling moratorium, which would not have affected the rig that exploded today:

Companies ranging from Chevron to Apache bussed in up to 5,000 employees to the Houston convention centre to underline to Washington the industry’s contribution to the country. [...]

“I have been in the oil and gas industry for 40 years, and this administration is trying to break us,” said Barbara Dianne Hagood, senior landman for Mariner Energy, a small company. “The moratorium they imposed is going to be a financial disaster for the gulf coast, gulf coast employees and gulf coast residents.”

Continue reading What could possibly go wrong?

Lakes of Pontchartrain

Continue reading Lakes of Pontchartrain

Don't tread on me

I'm sure the teabaggers will be rushing to defend the rights of free citizens in this case.

Last week, Drew Wheelan, the conservation coordinator for the American Birding Association, was filming himself across the street from the BP building/Deepwater Horizon response command in Houma, Louisiana. As he explained to me, he was standing in a field that did not belong to the oil company when a police officer approached him and asked him for ID and "strongly suggest[ed]" that he get lost since "BP doesn't want people filming".

Click the link for video.

Continue reading Don't tread on me

What could possibly go wrong?

GMO Compass:

On approximately 120 hectares across seven U.S. states from Florida to Texas, researchers will plant more than 200,000 GM eucalyptus trees. Developed by the ArborGen Company, the fast-growing trees are intended eventually to provide the raw materials for pulp, paper and bio-fuels and to minimise thereby the industrial use of forest land.

Field trials now should determine their suitability for the entire southern ‘timber belt’ of the USA: cold-sensitive, conventional eucalyptus varieties normally are confined to the state of Florida. However, the trials are controversial. Although site approvals had been issued previously, the new USDA permits allow flowering on all but one of the sites in question, as well as a greater density of trees.

Ah, memories.

Continue reading What could possibly go wrong?

Drill, baby, drill!

The US Coast Guard says five times as much oil as previously thought could be leaking from a well beneath where a rig sank in the Gulf of Mexico last week.

Rear Admiral Mary Landry said 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons) a day were now thought to be gushing into the sea 50 miles (80km) off Louisiana's coast.

A third leak had also been discovered at the site, Adm Landry said.

One fire-fighting expert told the BBC the disaster might become the "biggest oil spill in the world".

. . .

"The Exxon Valdez [tanker disaster off Alaska in 1989] is going to pale [into insignificance] in comparison to this as it goes on."

BBC.

And Obama decided it was OK to drill off the Virginia coast? Why? Because it might get Republicans in the Senate to vote for some of his initiatives?

Not smart.

Continue reading Drill, baby, drill!

Gas?

No gas at Costco this morning. Driving back from Richmond yesterday afternoon, the station i topped at on the NC/VA line was out of 89 and 93 grade gas.

Supposedly, supply interruptions caused by Hurricane Ike are to blame, but at least some reports have the shortages beginning in late August.

Meanwhile, 2/3 of North Carolinian adults think that opening our coastline to more drilling for oil will help.

Go figure.

Continue reading Gas?

Not so punitive?

Justice David Souter wrote for the court that punitive damages may not exceed what the company already paid to compensate victims for economic losses, about $500 million compensation.

Souter said that a penalty should be "reasonably predictable" in its severity.

Maybe we can just send them to their room for an hour of time-out?

Continue reading Not so punitive?

It beats going to Mars

McCain calls for $300 million prize for car battery

Republican John McCain said on Monday if elected president he would challenge American experts to develop a futuristic battery to power cars and win a $300 million prize.

. . .

"Whether it takes a meeting with automakers during my first month in office, or my signature on an act of Congress, we will meet the goal of a swift conversion of American vehicles away from oil," McCain told a town hall meeting in Fresno, in rural central California.

. . .

McCain said he would issue a Clean Car Challenge to U.S. automakers.

"For every automaker who can sell a zero-emissions car, we will commit a $5,000 dollar tax credit for each and every customer who buys that car. For other vehicles, whatever type they may be, the lower the carbon emissions, the higher the tax credit," he said.

And he offered a big reward for whoever comes up with a technological breakthrough: "A $300 million prize for the development of a battery package that has the size, capacity, cost and power to leapfrog the commercially available plug-in hybrids or electric cars."

I have absolutely no confidence that McCain can bring this proposal to reality, any more so than did George Bush with his Mars trip, yet this is still an important dialog to have. Let's see where Obama goes next.

And $300 million is actually, you know, real money.

Continue reading It beats going to Mars

Not in my back yard

This Ass Press article, which looks to have been reprinted in just about every newspaper in the country, talks about a letter drafted by Sen. Lamar Alexander's* (R-TN) office to the EPA. Seems the EPA wants to change rules governing how air pollution is measured in and around our national parks. Peak pollutant days would no longer be as signficant as the annual average of pollutants measured. As a result, more coal fired plants would be allowed to be built in the vicinity of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Alexander, along with Liddy Dole (R-NC) and a handful of other Senators have written a stern letter to the EPA. (Of the 4 Republicans signing the letter, 3 2 - Alexander, Dole, and John Warner (R-VA) are up for re-election in November; curiously, none of the signers currently has a text of the letter up on their websites.)

Here's my favorite part:

Alexander isn't against coal, which fuels about half the electric power generation in this country. But he worries a half dozen new coal plants are planned in Kentucky, Virginia and North Carolina, all within 200 miles of the Smokies. Thirty already operate in the region.

Here's my second favorite:

To lower $4-per-gallon-and-climbing gas prices, we have to honor the law of supply and demand. That means we have to find more, as well as use less.

. . .

States should be able to explore for more oil offshore, just as four states already do along the Gulf Coast. That would give money to the states for education, conservation, and to take care of their beaches.

One assumes that little of that drilling will be taking place off the coast of Tennessee.

==============
* To be honest, i had no idea that Lamar Alexander was still drawing breath, let alone serving in the US Senate. I wonder if Tennesseans had the same reaction.

UPDATE: Sen. Warner is retiring after his current term expires in January.

Continue reading Not in my back yard

We get letters

From our friends at the Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association
ECWA would like to extend a

Giant Thank You to the Beaver Lodge Local 1504!

Thank you for….

Being the coolest (non rodent) Beaver Lodge on the planet

Being funny, irreverent and effective

Your tireless work on the pageant

A million belly laughs

The outstanding contestants and crowd

Supporting ECWA’s efforts to protect Durham’s water, wetlands, open spaces and trails

Uplifting ECWA with your enormous show of community support for our work

Making Durham a great place to live and raise your beaver!

Peace, love, beaver,

The Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association
Don't forget to check back in soon for more BQP '08 video hilarity.

Continue reading We get letters

45

Republican John McCain would put the United States on course to build 45 new nuclear reactors by 2030 if elected president, the Arizona senator said on Wednesday.

McCain, his party's presumptive nominee in this fall's presidential election, is laying out his plan to make the country energy independent.

"If I am elected president, I will set this nation on a course to building 45 new reactors by the year 2030, with the ultimate goal of 100 new plants to power the homes and factories and cities of America," he said.

Where do you imagine we can put them? Seriously, are there 100 sites that have the necessary requirements (proximity to large amounts of water, far from population centers, etc.) to build new nukes? Are there 45? And to build them at the pace of two a year for the next 22 years? At $10 billion each, that's $450 billion. They'll certainly cost more than that by 2030. And 45 new plants, even higher capacity ones, still only replace 20% or so of our current fossil fuel generating capacity.

I may be busy today, scouring the map looking for sites that will pass muster.

Continue reading 45

Living under a rock

OK, so Republicans in the Senate have successfully filibustered a new bill which would, however tentatively, put the US on a path to reduce carbon emissions. That's not unsurprising. And hey, it's pretty likely that the bill's "cap and trade" plan isn't perfect, and we can probably do better after the election when maybe we'll have the 60 votes we need to smack down this filibustering of every goddamn bill that they don't like.

But this?

(C)ritics of the bill said it threatened economic growth and would raise people's energy bills.

Seriously, do Republican Senators live completely cloistered lives? Do any of them ever, you know, have to pay for a tank of gas or an electric bill?

Hasn't current policy "threatened economic growth" and "raised people's energy bills" without providing any relief from carbon emissions? Oh, yeah, and massive profits for oil companies.

I think cutting into those is what might be generating opposition from Senate Republicans, no?

UPDATE: The N&O reports that North Carolina's two Republican Senators are split on this bill, with Richard Burr opposing it ("It's a Ponzi scheme," Burr said.) and Liddy Dole supporting it How much of Liddy's support is based on her reelection prospects?

Asked whether she thought global warming would be part of her campaign, Dole said she thinks voters may be focused on other issues.

"Obviously it's something I'll talk about from time to time because it's a major issue that we face, but in terms of what people ask about, I think frankly the immigration issue will be talked about a lot more," Dole said.

Global catastrophe vs. scary brown people? Hmmm. We know where Republicans' priorities lie.

Continue reading Living under a rock

June 3, 1979

Is it really 29 years?

Bless my friends who are still fighting the good fight.

Continue reading June 3, 1979