Climate Change Whacking Fracking: This past summer showed how under climate change, the resulting droughts could rob fracking operations of water, an essential ingredient needed to harvest oil and gas from shale deposits, reports Michael Klare at Tomdispatch. Some US drillers found themselves competing with food producers for scarce water, while others had to suspend drilling. And the competition for water will become worse as climate change continues, scientists predict.
Senate Candidates Wield Climate Change Issue, reports Joe Romm at Climate Progress, using it to differentiate themselves from climate change denial opponents, and to highlight the danger of electing such scientifically ignorant people to Congress. Recent polls identify addressing climate change as a winning issue for attracting independent voters. At least SOME of the pols are listening...
Tea Party Attacks Clean Energy in AZ, reports David Roberts at Climate Progress. More extreme Republicans are attempting to weaken existing policy that promotes solar development in this sunny state. The solar future there will be decided by current elections - and hopefully not by the Tea Party...
Wind Energy Keeps Dry Farms Aloft, says Bob Dean at the Natural Resources Defense Council blog. As the drought causes crops and cattle to fail, the guaranteed revenues from harvesting wind on some farms keeps them from going bankrupt. What more does Congress need to continue support of the wind industry?
Win With Green, Say US Sports, according to Game Changer, a new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council that highlights the increasing successful use of energy efficiency and sustainability measures among the major US sports leagues. Go teams!
This Is Your Planet On Global Warming should be the title of this incredible, dramatic 26-second video created by the National Atmospheric and Space Administration, which shows the effects of over 100 years of warming on planetary surface temperatures.... Thanks to huffblogger A. Siegel, who reminded me of it last week.
Gotta Vent Department: Even though Jim Lehrer received the most petition signatures (+160,000) in history to include a particular issue in the presidential debate, neither he, Obama or Romney ever mentioned climate change. Really. Alas, no surprise. But it wasn't even mentioned in the much more honest and frank Bill O'Reilly/Jon Stewart rumble 2012!!! Ah, Jonnie, m'laddie, I thought you capable of so much better: the fate of medicare will be irrelevant if we do not address the fate of our environment.
Do you know of a good video or graphic connected with climate change? Do you have a cool "Every day is Earth Day" nature picture of yours you'd like to share with us? Put a weblink to it in the comments section below, and we'll see if we can post it.
Every day is Earth Day, folks, as I was reminded by these rare fire moths camouflaged on an Indian Blanket daisy I photographed one past summer day. Making the U.S. a global clean energy leader will ensure a heck of a lot more jobs, and a clean, safe future, despite what Mitt Romney thinks. If you'd like to tell Congress you'll VOTE for clean energy you can join the increasing numbers of people doing so here. For more detailed summaries of the above and other climate change items, audio podcasts and texts are freely available.
