Yearly Archives: 2013

America’s Dangerous Pipelines

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I think there is a belief that pipelines are safer than trucks,trains, or boats for shipping liquid hydrocarbon fuels. That may actually be true. I don’t know what would happen if we stopped all the pipelines and switched to vehicles. But the idea that pipelines are safe is absurd and it is time people started to realize this.

The Center for Biological Diversity has posted an interesting analysis by Richard Stover, which we can see in the form of a video.

This time-lapse video shows pipeline incidents from 1986 to 2013, relying on publicly available data from the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration. Only incidents classified as “significant” by the agency are shown in the video. “Significant” incidents include those in which someone was hospitalized or killed, damages amounted to more than $50,000, more than 5 barrels of highly volatile substances or 50 barrels of other liquid were released, or where the liquid exploded or burned.

Most of what is spilled is oil, but there is also liquified natural gas, gasoline, diesel, propane, LP, jet fuel and other substances. The original post has a lot of other information, you should check it out.

Hat Tip: Paul Douglas.

The Atlantic Hurricane Season So Far

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This is early in the year for Atlantic hurricanes, though we are already up to “D” in named storms. The current mane floating around in the Atlantic is “Dorian” which the National Weather Service is shortly going to rename “Dorian The Zombie.” Dorian was a named tropical storm several days ago, disappeared into a system not worth of a name, then re-organized a bit so they are using the name again, and is expected to spit lightly on Florida and then wander off to the Hurricane Graveyard in the mid Atlantic.

From NOAA: The average cumulative number of Atlantic storm systems per year.
From NOAA: The average cumulative number of Atlantic storm systems per year.

In a typical Atlantic hurricane season, we expect to see about 2 named systems by August 1st, 3 by August 13th, so we are pretty much on track in this year which was predicted months go to be a more active than average year. However some meteorologists expect the next several days or weeks to have fewer hurricanes than normal because of a very interesting phenomenon happening right now: The Atlantic is experiencing a kind of dust storm. Normally, a large amount of dust is blown into the air off the surface of the Sahara this time of year, in waves that happen every few days for a period of time. This dust is blown into the atmosphere and falls down wind at various distances, a good amount of it ending up in the Atlantic Ocean. At present a larger than average amount of dust is being kicked up, and has formed a ginormous plume heading for South and Central America. Here is a modeled simulation of what is happening, from NOAA:

I’m not sure how this is experienced on the ground. I imagine that where this cloud encounters rain storms the rain becomes somewhat gritty and dirty. In the air, a cloud of dust like this can actually affect air travel, though minimally. Patrick Lockerby noted this (a couple of years ago) about Saharan dust and air planes:

Although this dust is abrasive, it is much less of a threat to aviation than the dust from a volcanic eruption. Whereas volcanic dust melts in a jet engine and coats the moving parts, sand needs a higher temperature to melt, and so is merely passed through a jet engine. In the case of piston engines, in the air or on land, desert dust can quickly choke an air filter. The effect can range from the stalling of the engine to the somewhat trivial need to change an air filter more often.

I imagine that people living in areas where a lot of this dust is brought to the ground in rain will mainly notice that everything is slightly dirtier rather than cleaner after the storm, like we experience in temperate regions during pollen season.

The reason I mention the dust is is this: there is the possibility that huge plumes of dust in the atmosphere over the tropical Atlantic will reduce the likelihood of tropical storm formation. There may be

…a correlation between hurricane activity in the Atlantic and thick clouds of dust that periodically rise from the Sahara Desert and blow off Africa’s northwest coast. … during periods of intense hurricane activity, dust [is] relatively scarce in the atmosphere, while in years when stronger dust storms rose up, fewer hurricanes swept across the Atlantic….

… this makes sense, because dry, dust-ridden layers of air probably help to “dampen” brewing hurricanes, which need heat and moisture to fuel them. [This] could also mean that dust storms have the potential to shift a hurricane’s direction further to the west, which means it would have a higher chance of hitting the United States and Caribbean islands..

John Metcalfe has put this all together in a post on Quartz, which includes some spectacular photographs of floating Saharan dust from various angles.

The Problem With The Global Food Supply: New Research

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Emily S Cassidy, Paul C West, James S Gerber and Jonathan A Foley, from the University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment, have produced a very important study for IOP Science Environmental Research Letters. (This is OpenAccess so you can access it openly!) You know Emily as one of the participants in our CONvergence panel on food last July. The research Emily and her colleagues do is some of the most important work being done right now, because it is about the food supply.

ResearchBlogging.orgThe bottom line is this: When we look at our food supply, we find that a large amount of what is grown in agricultural fields does not make it into the stomachs of people. There is a lot of waste, there are problems with delivery and distribution, and so on. But what this study looks at is the percentage of potential calories that go to non-food final products, or do get into our diets but do so in a way that significantly reduces the efficiency of the system. There has been a huge increase (percentage wise) in how much field crop is used for biofuels instead of food, but the total amount now is still only 4%. Also, one could argue that this is good use of field crops if the production of biofuels reduces carbon emissions (which is only partly the case). More importantly, a huge amount of the corn and other crops (but mainly corn) that is grown is used as animal feed, and only about 12% of that, in terms of calories, ends up in the human diet. The reduction is because as we move up trophic levels, energy is taken out of the flow.

This graphic from Cassidy et al shows the distribution of calories across food and non-food destinations:

Figure 2. Calorie delivery and losses from major crops. Calories delivered are shown in green (this includes plant and animal calories) and calories that are lost to meat and dairy conversion as well as biofuels and other uses are shown in red.
Figure 2. Calorie delivery and losses from major crops. Calories delivered are shown in green (this includes plant and animal calories) and calories that are lost to meat and dairy conversion as well as biofuels and other uses are shown in red.

The graphic at the top of the post is also from the paper, and has this caption: “Figure 1. Calorie delivery fraction per hectare. The proportions of produced calories that are delivered as food are shown.” The thing to note here is the unevenness across the globe in efficiency of calorie production-to-plate. There seems to be a latitude effect, and I wonder if that has anything to do with the environment and seasonality. But the largest contributor to this variation in efficiency is probably simply the amount of meat in regional diets. As Emily points out in the video that accompanies the paper, even small changes in dietary practices can result in large changes in ultimate agricultural productivity.

We, as a species, need to eat less meat. In particular, certain groups of people, like Americans, need to eat less meat. So let’s do that: Eat less meat!

As an aside, Emily is a friend and colleague and I’ve been really impressed with her work and have been very excited to see these important results coming out. Go Emily! (And co-authors, of course.)

Cassidy, Emily, West, Paul, Gerber, James, & Foley, Jonathan (2013). Redefining agricultural yields: from tonnes to people nourished per hectare IOP Science, 8 (2) DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/8/3/034015

Mark Kessler has been suspended.

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As I suggested might happen, the town of Gilberton, Pennsylvania suddenly realized that having an over the top crazy gun nut as chief of police use town weapons to make his own YouTube video threatening a large percentage of the citizens of the United States was not a good idea. When Kessler finally goes over the top and opens fire on a bunch of people he disagrees with, the town probably does not want to be involved as his employer or as the entity that owns the weapons (though as I understand it, Kessler bought the weapons with his own money and gave them to the police force, probably as a way of getting around the fact that his favorite toys are banned except for official use).

Unfortunately, the suspension is temporary …

In a closed meeting, the council voted 5-1 to suspended Kessler for 30 days, “for use of borough property for non-borough purposes without prior borough permission.” In one of the videos, the tiny town’s sole police officer used automatic weapons, which he was only legally authorized to do in his official capacity.

After the vote, there was what PennLive’s John Luciew described as an “impromptu gun rights rally,” with supporters with “all manner of firearms strapped to their belts and hanging from their shoulders.”

… but I’m guessing this is only a first step.

The image above, from here, shows some of the other gun nuts from Gilberton who formed a heavily armed mob to protest the town’s decision.

The Lake That Ate Santa Claus (and some bad reporting?)

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OK, so supposedly a fresh water lake has appeared at the North Pole and it is ENORMOUS and Santa Claus has been missing since and is presumed dead. OK, not really. The Giant Lake is really just a “pond” of meltwater on top of the polar sea ice, on the North Pole. But wait, actually, it is not really at the North Pole, it was photographed by some scientists who hang around the North Pole but this pond, which is small but was photographed with a wide angle lens, isn’t really exactly at the North Pole anyway, and these ponds form there all the time in the summer.

But really, even though they form all the time in the summer you can bet that fresh water ponding on the surface of the ice in the Arctic is way more common these days on average, than it was in the past because, in fact, arctic ice is melting a lot more than it was in the past. But the fresh water on the surface is not the point; the point is ice free sea surface in the Arctic, which has been at an all time high over the last few years. And this has caused serious concern that gas escape pathways will be opened up in the Arctic sea. This would mean that methane currently trapped in the form of methane hydrates on and beneath the surface of the world’s oceans, where they are near the surface in the Arctic, will be more easily released in abundance. Methane itself is a powerful greenhouse gas and could cause very rapid warming that would in turn increase the release of methane. Also, as methane is “oxidized” (i.e., chemically undergoes a similar process to burning but without the fire part) it turns into CO2 and water. This in turn uses up the area’s oxygen. If enough methane hydrate oxidizes in the Arctic sea that region could become anoxic (the oxygen to make the CO2 and Water from Methane Hydrate is taken out of the water or air where it happens) and lots of species could go extinct instantly. And it could even remove enough Oxygen from the air that …. OMG, that sounds pretty bad.

We can not say that “ponding” on the arctic ice is not related to global warming. Melting ice in the Arctic … every drop of it, or should I say every ice cube of it, melts because of heat and this heat is greater because of global warming. Some of that water in those ponds would not be there were it not for global warming. It is not like “nature” does some things (like, melt stuff) and “global warming” does some things and they are separated. Long gone are the days when we can, or should, say “you can’t attribute a specific weather event to global warming.” Rather, we need to say “you can’t remove global warming as a factor in any weather event.” Seriously. The former is an absolutely out and out lie. The latter is 99% true, something you should bet on if you don’t want to be wrong most of the time.

Still, the water on the surface of the ice is not of any great interest. I’m not sure, though, which is worse: Pointing out that the water is ponding on the surface of the ice and causing people to think this is important because it was mentioned in the Christian Science Monitor or some place, or spending a lot of effort explaining that this one thing some reporters said (but that no scientists have said) is not important and therefore (to some) GLOBAL WARMING IS A HOAX AIEEEEEEE!!!!1!!

(How likely that is to happen and how bad it would be is currently very much a matter of debate. But trust me, keep an eye on the methane hydrates. Even a low level of conversion into gas could be pretty serious stuff.)

Speaking of the Christian Science Monitor … this is the possible bad reporting part … I have a vague memory of a couple years back when somebody quoted themselves in some sort of science news story or blog or whatever. Is that what this is?

New_lake_at_North_Pole__More_of_a_pond__really_-_CSMonitor.com

The part circled in red is simply the text of a previously posted item on the CSM web site. This story quotes this.

The photograph above, from the North Pole Observatory web cam, is of the pond, except since this photograph was taken just a few minutes ago it shows it as all frozen over again because these things come and go. Compare the photo to this one posted by Maggie Koerth Baker.

Stem Cells Approved By Vatican May Not Exist

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… which would be really funny because … well, you clearly see why this is funny.

Christian groups and sects are often opposed to the use of biological tissue that would otherwise be discarded in research and therapy including “stem cell research.” This is because they think some of that biological tissue could be future parishioners, or because they watched too many Disney movies involving fairies. Or something. Anyway, there is this one kind of stem cell that exists among regular cells that can be extracted from the body of a living, breathing already signed up parishioners and the use of these stem cells to cure horrid diseases and such would not violate anyone’s sensibilities. So The Church has (more or less) said OK to that. The problem is, they, these stem cells, might not actually exist. From a news report in Nature:

Proponents of very small embryonic-like cells (VSELs) extracted from bone marrow say that the cells have the potential to transform regenerative medicine. A trial has begun in Poland, and cell-therapy company Neostem in New York is planning another in Michigan.

But in a major blow to the field, a paper published on 24 July in Stem Cell Reports suggests that the diminutive stem cells are not real1. Led by Irving Weissman, a prominent stem-cell researcher at Stanford University in California, the study is the fourth to refute the cells’ existence — and the most thorough yet.

It will be interesting to see how this works out.

Terry McAuliffe vs. Ken Cuccinelli

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This is a very important political ad because it involves climate change and climate change denialism in the political process. This (involvement) needs to happen in every single campaign from now on, for every single office. This is a start. A slow start, but at least a start.

There is important context for this ad that you can get HERE from Peter Sinclair.

All we need to do to fix our system of education is …

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… well, actually, you can start by shutting up.

Then, while you are sitting there quietly read this: Why Teaching Is Harder Than It Looks.

Then, add your advice about how we can fix our system of education to the comments below. But each suggestion must be paid for (with money) and fit into the schedule (by paying someone to do what you suggest instead of what they are at present required to do).

Which means, ultimately, there is one fundamental answer to improving our system of education: Throw money at it. For starters, stop taking money away from it. The, put more in.

Discuss.

Photo Credit: chrissuderman via Compfight cc

Al-Kadada evidence for 5,500 year old human sacrifice

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This is a site in the vicinity of Meroe in the Sudan, and seem to date to a period of transition between foraging and farming. From The Telegraph:

In a graveyard in Al-Kadada, north of Khartoum, the archaeologists have dug up the tomb of a man and a woman facing each other in a ditch, with bodies of two women, two goats and a dog buried nearby.

The discovery of the group “confirms” excavations last year which found traces of the oldest human sacrifice ever identified in Africa, Jacques Reinold, a researcher for the French section of the Sudanese antiquities department, said.

What do you think about the interpretations being offered? Do you think that the earliest archaeological evidence of “human sacrifice” is likely to be one of the first instances of such behavior? What are the alternative interpretations of this find?

Photo is of rock art from Tadrart Acacus in Ghat District of western Libya, in the Sahara, part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site, dating to between about 12,000 and 1,900 years ago.

“We Have To Shut It Down”

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UPDATE: Mass Coal Plant Protest Happening Now FOLLOW: ?@oharjo #summerheat #coalisstupid #CloseBraytonPt @350Mass @efeghali for updates.

UPDATE Brayton Point Coal Plant Protest Live Streaming HERE.

This morning, Sunday, July 28th, there is an action happening in Southeastern Massachusetts. A group of climate activists are going to shut down a coal plant and replace it with solar panels and wind generators.

Obviously the solar panels and wind generators will be mainly symbolic because you can’t build a lot of large infrastructure while the police are bearing down on you. Indeed, local police have been depicted in the press as being ready to grab all the protestors and take them to “an undisclosed location.” Sounds ominous. Word from the street, by the way, is that the local police and authorities have been having reasonable discussions with the protesters, so while I would expect nearly 50 arrests or so, there won’t be a riot and no on is going to Guantanamo. But, an important point will be made. And you need to know the point.

This is a Summer Heat protest against, at the immediate and small scale, the operation of the Brayton Point coal plant, which is the largest fossil fuel burner in the Northeast. The protest calls “or Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and others to immediately close the Brayton Point coal plant and ensure a just transition for workers and host communities towards a healthy and sustainable future.”

This is not the first protest activity at this power point. In mid may, a boat was set up to interfere with a large coal delivery. From a piece in The Nation about Ken Ward and Jay O’Hara’s earlier activities:

Early on the morning of May 15 … Ken and Jay motored up to Brayton Point in a thirty-two-foot lobster boat, which they’d acquired and rechristened the Henry David T., flying an American flag and a banner that read #coalisstupid. They were about two hours ahead of the Energy Enterprise, and Jay, skippering, positioned the lobster boat in the ship channel along the pier—right where the 689-foot freighter would have to dock and unload. Intending to stay a while, they proceeded to drop a well-fastened, 200-pound mushroom anchor off the stern of the Henry David T.

Ken called the Somerset police and said they were there to carry out a peaceful protest. Sometime before 11 am, the Energy Enterprise came into view, followed close by multiple high-speed Coast Guard boats. As the freighter bore down on Ken and Jay, the ship’s captain made radio contact, ascertained their intentions, and advised them and the Coast Guard that he had ordered “defensive measures” on deck and was prepared to “protect” his crew. Meanwhile, from somewhere above them on the pier, Ken and Jay heard the distinctive chck-chck of a rifle, chambered and ready. When the freighter finally came to a stop, its prow loomed over the lobster boat. Coast Guard personnel boarded the Henry David T. and ….

The action is going to happen in about 31 minutes as I write this. Keep an eye on the news. Let every one know this is happening/has happened.

Oh, and to the protesters carrying out this action: Thank you for your service.

Gilberton, Pennsylvania Police Chief Mark Kessler

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OK, watch this and answer a question for me. The question is, does our American love for free speech translate into ignoring this man’s behavior, or does our (seemingly less important) American love for freedom for all require that a person who behaves this way NOT be the chief of police of any governmental unit of any size, ever, anywhere?

(NOT WORK SAFE)

If I lived in Gilberton, Pennsylvania, I’d probably start carrying around a gun to protect myself from the police chief. I wouldn’t do that because I love guns or really want to carry one around. I would do so because I consider myself a potential target of Chief Kessler’s, even now, living hundreds of miles away from him. It would be very hard for him to make more clear the fact that he is waiting for the opportunity to kill “libtards” when the opportunity arises, and it is abundantly clear from this video (and his other videos) that Chief Kessler is fully unhinged and should not be trusted with a weapon of any kind.

A little context from Hunter at Daily Kos:

Mr. Kessler has managed to accidentally shoot himself in the past. No, none of us are particularly surprised. Yes, Mr. Kessler has formed his own militia group in the event that federal law enforcement officials may at some point try to take his guns and therefore will need to be shot—but fear not, as he is very clear that you may only murder federal law enforcement officials with “just cause,” and there is nobody better at determining when there is “just cause” to start murdering people than a group of gun-hoarding conspiracy theorists agitated about the perceived power of the United Nations.

Police Chief Mark Kessler: Yeah, we’ve got to take away his guns.