The Tree | — Intro The arguments for rejecting the construction of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline just got stronger: this time its about carbon emissions. On last Monday, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) challenged the State Department to revisit its environmental impact analysis of the pipeline, saying that developing Canada’s tar sands “represents […]
- Africa (236)
- Animals (1)
- Asia (1,219)
- Australasia (8)
- Australia (24)
- Authoritarianism (382)
- Canada (6)
- Cats (1)
- Celtic Religion (1)
- Culture (515)
- Dehydration (1)
- Democracy (322)
- Dissent (418)
- Ecology (1)
- Economy (1,015)
- Agriculture (3)
- Banking (67)
- Carbon Footprint (6)
- Corporations (48)
- Cryptocurrency (2)
- Debt (21)
- Democratic Socialism (20)
- Demographic Decline (1)
- Development (26)
- Employment (118)
- Food Insecurity (21)
- Homelessness (15)
- Industry (4)
- Inequality (418)
- Inflation (4)
- infrastructure (10)
- Investment (92)
- Market Crash (10)
- Middle Class (61)
- Monopolies (8)
- Neoliberalism (198)
- Plutocracy (611)
- Poverty (202)
- Regulation (2)
- Sanctions (4)
- Taxes (36)
- Technology (3)
- Trade (113)
- Weapons sales (6)
- Education (127)
- Elderly (3)
- Electricity Cost (2)
- Energy (1,691)
- Batteries (47)
- Coal (137)
- Fossil Fuels (317)
- Fracking (50)
- Geothermal (7)
- Green ammonia (5)
- Green Energy (409)
- Green Hydrogen (8)
- Heat Pumps (5)
- Hydroelectric (14)
- Natural Gas (106)
- Nuclear Energy (156)
- Petroleum (296)
- Power Grid (12)
- Pumped Hydro (6)
- Solar Energy (396)
- Tar Sands (13)
- Wave Energy (9)
- wind energy (331)
- Environment (2,586)
- Climate Change (1,534)
- Acidification of Oceans (54)
- Agriculture (25)
- Biodiversity (12)
- Climate Refugees (2)
- CO2 (111)
- Dehydration (5)
- Denialism (145)
- Desalinization (4)
- Desertification (158)
- Divestment (2)
- Dust Storms (6)
- Environmental Investment (1)
- Extreme Weather (294)
- Flooding (132)
- Food Supply (2)
- Forests (17)
- Green New Deal (39)
- Greenwashing (3)
- Mass Extinction (61)
- Methane (20)
- Net Carbon Zerio (8)
- Nitrous Oxide (2)
- Rainforests (19)
- Rivers (11)
- Sea Level (333)
- Soil Carbon Release (14)
- Super Storms (250)
- wildfires (231)
- Wood Buildings (1)
- Climate Crisis (1,237)
- Drought (286)
- Ecology (10)
- Environmentalism (392)
- Green Transportation (249)
- Ice Melt (132)
- Invasive Species (2)
- Islands (1)
- Oceans (100)
- Oil Spills (7)
- Pollution (226)
- Water (92)
- wildlife (19)
- Climate Change (1,534)
- Europe (1,330)
- Featured (3,849)
- fiction (5)
- Food (13)
- G20 (1)
- Guns (9)
- Health (659)
- History (339)
- Human Rights (1,380)
- Apartheid (256)
- censorship (278)
- Death Penalty (30)
- Disappeared (3)
- Displaced and Refugees (554)
- Food Insecurity (11)
- Gay rights (28)
- Genocide (24)
- Human Rights Watch (90)
- Migrants (4)
- Slavery and Trafficking (16)
- Torture (96)
- Trans Rights (3)
- Transgender Rights (4)
- Unlawful Imprisonment (99)
- Unlwful Killing (75)
- War Crimes (360)
- War Rape (7)
- Immigration (20)
- International (788)
- Islamophobia (374)
- Juan Cole (270)
- Latin America (97)
- Latinos (4)
- leisure (21)
- media (467)
- Middle East (9,222)
- Arab World (5,140)
- Iran (1,272)
- Israel (865)
- Israel/ Palestine (3,025)
- Israel/Palestine (8)
- Kurds (289)
- Turkey (573)
- Turkiye (99)
- military (123)
- Modernism (3)
- nationalism (116)
- NATO (36)
- Natural Disasters (13)
- Neocolonialism (1)
- nuclear weapons (103)
- Patriarchy (10)
- Peace (135)
- Persian mythology (1)
- Pete Buttigieg (1)
- Planetary Exploration (1)
- Popular Culture (24)
- Poverty (12)
- privacy (21)
- racism (462)
- Rape (8)
- religion (1,463)
- Rights (139)
- robots (3)
- Romance (1)
- science (146)
- Secular (West) (9)
- Secularism (30)
- Sexual Assault (2)
- South Pacific (2)
- Spirituality (22)
- Statelessness (15)
- Stranded Assets (1)
- Surveillance (278)
- Terrorism (1,089)
- Tolerance (6)
- Uncategorized (8,075)
- United Nations (134)
- Urbanization (4)
- US Foreign Policy (1,260)
- US politics (5,215)
- Anti-War Movement (12)
- Campaign Finance (31)
- Censors (21)
- Central Intelligence Agency (62)
- Charity (1)
- Civil Rights (96)
- Congress (76)
- Conspiracy Theories (23)
- Constitution (394)
- Courts (12)
- crime (12)
- Democratic Party (935)
- Democratic Socialists of America (22)
- Domestic Terrorism (20)
- Drone Warfare (27)
- Espionage (124)
- Ethnicities (380)
- Far Right (385)
- FBI (47)
- Foreign Policy (204)
- Gay Rights (17)
- Guns (94)
- Immigration (234)
- Israel Lobbies (122)
- Marijuana (4)
- Militarization (271)
- National Security State (471)
- Native Americans (40)
- Nuclear arsenal (7)
- penitentiaries (6)
- Pentagon (556)
- Police (43)
- prison reform (8)
- Private Prisons (2)
- Progressive Politics (12)
- Puerto Rico (30)
- Religious Right (15)
- Reproductive Choice (66)
- Republican Party (2,912)
- Supreme Court (125)
- Voter suppression (35)
- Whistleblowers (5)
- Xenophobia (9)
- Veterans (35)
- Voting Rights (16)
- War (494)
- White Supremacists (225)
- wikileaks (8)
- women (550)
- workers (231)
- Writing (5)
- Youth (207)
Petroleum
Big Oil wants N. Dakota to ease radioactive waste laws on Fracking
RT | – “Amid falling oil prices nationwide, energy industry players in North Dakota want officials to alter radioactive waste disposal laws so that more toxic fracking fluid can be stored in-state, saving companies tens of thousands of dollars per truckload.” RT: “Big Oil wants N. Dakota to ease radioactive waste laws – to save […]
The false promise of fracking and local jobs
By Susan Christopherson | (The Conversation) In a surprise decision that led to consternation in the oil and gas industry and elation among fracking opponents, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo in December banned fracking in the state. He attributed his decision to unresolved health risks associated with this drilling technique, but the governor surely also […]
New Saudi King to Obama: Lower-price Oil Policy won’t Change
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) – President Obama cut short his India trip to head off to Riyadh in the wake of the death last Thursday of King Abdallah of Saudi Arabia. Some 30 members of the Washington elite came along, of both parties, including Sen. John McCain and Rep. Nancy Pelosi. This love […]
Why Fracking & Tar Sands are Doomed: Low-Cost Oil and Pollution
Tom Giesen| (Informed Comment) — Here is a brief primer on the real implications of the decline of oil prices and environmental degradation on the unconventional petroleum industry (fracking, tar sands and deep-water drilling). Oil has been relatively inexpensive, energy intensive, portable, relatively safe, convertible to myriad uses – an incredibly useful substance, especially in […]
Massive Oil spill from major pipeline threatens Israel nature reserve
AFP | — “A major pipeline leak has caused oil to gush into the Arava desert in southern Israel, threatening a protected nature reserve, officials said Thursday.” AFP: “Oil spill from major pipeline threatens Israel nature reserve”
Threatened by ISIL/Daesh, Kurds Maneuver between Baghdad and Ankara
Iraqi Kurds Seek Greater Balance between Ankara and Baghdad By Mohammed A. Salih ERBIL, Dec 4 2014 (IPS) – After a period of frostiness, Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and Turkey seem intent on mending ties, as each of the parties show signs of needing the other. But the Kurds appear more cautious this time […]
Antarctica Glaciers Melting 3 Times Faster than 10 Years Ago
American Geophysical Union | — West Antarctic melt rate has tripled “Joint Press Release WASHINGTON, D.C. – A comprehensive, 21-year analysis of the fastest-melting region of Antarctica has found that the melt rate of glaciers there has tripled during the last decade. The glaciers in the Amundsen Sea Embayment in West Antarctica are hemorrhaging ice […]
Why it makes Economic Sense for Universities to Divest from Fossil Fuels
By John Quiggin, The University of Queensland The controversy ignited by the Australian National University in October, when it decided to sell its shares in seven resources companies, has raised two important questions about divestment from assets such as fossil fuels. The first is whether divestment is an economically prudent choice, and the second is […]