ENVIRONMENTAL LEGAL BLOGS

Gov’t Posts 61 New Federal Regulations, Including 500-Page Rule to Protect ‘Critical Habitat’ of Flycatcher | CNS News

The federal government posted 61 new regulations in the Federal Register on Friday, including the Department of Interior’s 500-page document outlining a new rule to protect the southwestern willow flycatcher’s “critical habitat” in six states.

That small insect-eating bird’s habitat covers 1,227 miles of streams and 208,973 acres in California, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Utah and New Mexico, on “federal, state, tribal and private lands.”

via cnsnews.com

As one commentator on the article noted: "500 pages - think about how much time had to go into that - then realize that somebody(ies) were paid for that time, probably pretty well - then tell me again how we have a "revenue" problem, and not a spending problem. Take your time - I'll wait...."

New regulations pull the plug on the 75-watt incandescent light - KTIV News 4 Sioux City IA: News, Weather and Sports#.UOMKb8WHSG0.email

New regulations pull the plug on the 75-watt incandescent light - KTIV News 4 Sioux City IA: News, Weather and Sports#.UOMKb8WHSG0.email

Candian Broadcasting Company reports on exploitation of US green energy program

The mystery of the trainload of biodiesel that crossed back and forth across the Sarnia-Port Huron border without ever unloading its cargo, as reported by CBC News, has been solved.

CBC News received several tips after a recent story about a company shipping the same load of biodiesel back and forth by CN Rail at a cost of $2.6 million in the summer of 2010. It turns out the shipments were part of a deal by a Toronto-based company, which made several million dollars importing and exporting the fuel to exploit a loophole in a U.S. green energy program.

 

From http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/12/19/mystery-biodiesel-train-credits.html

From UPI: Vultures are not cars' friends in Florida Everglades

EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, Fla., Dec. 29 (UPI) --
Park rangers in the Florida Everglades are offering visitors loaner
bungee cords and tarps to protect their cars from marauding vultures.

The big black birds apparently have a taste for automotive rubber...

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2012/12/29/Vultures-vex-Everglades-visitors/UPI-39161356805691/#ixzz2GYKR6RtK

From AP-Trains carrying more oil across US amid boom

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) - Energy companies behind the oil boom on the Northern Plains are increasingly turning to an industrial-age workhorse - the locomotive - to move their crude to refineries across the U.S., as plans for new pipelines stall and existing lines can't keep up with demand.

Delivering oil thousands of miles by rail from the heartland to refineries on the East, West and Gulf coasts costs more, but it can mean increased profits - up to $10 or more a barrel - because of higher oil prices on the coasts. That works out to about $700,000 per train.

The parade of mile-long trains carrying hazardous material out of North Dakota and Montana and across the country has experts and federal regulators concerned. Rail transport is less safe than pipelines, they say, and the proliferation of oil trains raises the risk of a major derailment and spill.

    The environmental fears carry an ironic twist: Oil trains are gaining popularity in part because of a shortage of pipeline capacity - a problem that has been worsened by environmental opposition to such projects as TransCanada's stalled Keystone XL pipeline. That project would carry Bakken and Canadian crude to the Gulf of Mexico. 

http://www.abc-7.com/story/20441307/trains-carrying-more-oil-across-us-amid-boom

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Comment:  There is no free lunch.  Every action has a consequence.  The Keystone Pipeline should have been approved, and the failrue to approve it has only made environmental risks more severe.

Environmental Legal Blogs - Now on YouTube

Have you seen our Environmental Legal Videos on YouTube? Here's one, regarding how you should react if a government agency or individual makes an environmental claim against you or your business:

More Environmental Legal Blogs videos are available by clicking the link to YouTube, on the left.

Wind farms can cause climate change, finds new study - Telegraph

Usually at night the air closer to the ground becomes colder when the sun goes down and the earth cools.

But on huge wind farms the motion of the turbines mixes the air higher in the atmosphere that is warmer, pushing up the overall temperature.

Satellite data over a large area in Texas, that is now covered by four of the world's largest wind farms, found that over a decade the local temperature went up by almost 1C as more turbines are built.

This could have long term effects on wildlife living in the immediate areas of larger wind farms.

via www.telegraph.co.uk

EPA Honors Hispanic Heritage Month With Picture Of Marxist Killer Che Guevara - Investors.com

The EPA has commemorated the start of Hispanic Heritage Month with an emailed picture of Marxist thug Che Guevara. Considering the agency's totalitarian energy policies, it's somehow appropriate.

The internal email sent by EPA management analyst Susie Goldring was said to have been issued without clearance from higher-ups. EPA said it was "drafted and sent by an individual employee, and without official clearance."

But sent it was, a document with a photo of a mural with a visage of the murderous revolutionary that was lifted without attribution from the website, www.buzzle.com. Guevara, of course, was an enemy of the very freedom that Hispanics, particularly from Cuba, came here seeking.

via news.investors.com

Federal court refuses to restrain EPA tests

Two posts below, I reported that the Court was holding a hearing on restrasining those tests.  The Court  declined to issue a restrining order, so the EPA testing will proceed.

Global warming stopped 16 years ago, reveals Met Office report quietly released| Mail Online

The world stopped getting warmer almost 16 years ago, according to new data released last week. 

The figures, which have triggered debate among climate scientists, reveal that from the beginning of 1997 until August 2012, there was no discernible rise in aggregate global temperatures.

This means that the ‘plateau’ or ‘pause’ in global warming has now lasted for about the same time as the previous period when temperatures rose, 1980 to 1996. Before that, temperatures had been stable or declining for about 40 years.

via www.dailymail.co.uk

    Food for thought-this article is getting wide play on the Internet and is, of coruse, provoking a questioning reaction from the University of East Anglia (Britain), where the chief proponent of the warming theory (Prof. Phil Jones) resides.