The world’s largest underground aquifers – a source of fresh water for hundreds of millions of people — are being depleted at alarming rates, according to new NASA satellite data that provides the most detailed picture yet of vital water reserves hidden under the Earth’s surface.
Twenty-one of the world’s 37 largest aquifers — in locations from India and China to the United States and France — have passed their sustainability tipping points, meaning more water was removed than replaced during the decade-long study period, researchers announced Tuesday. Thirteen aquifers declined at rates that put them into the most troubled category. The researchers said this indicated a long-term problem that’s likely to worsen as reliance on aquifers grows.
Two of the most stressed aquifers on the planet are the Arabian Aquifer, and another major one stretching between India and Pakistan.
Given the role of drought and heat in the current Syria/ISIS crisis, does one still have to ask what could go wrong if the water supplies for a critical global oil supplier, and one stretched between two not-very-friendly nuclear nations, suddenly slow to a trickle.
Meanwhile, in America’s most drought stricken area, wealthy conservatives show typical can-do American community spirit in responding.
Drought or no drought, Steve Yuhas resents the idea that it is somehow shameful to be a water hog. If you can pay for it, he argues, you should get your water.
I watched “Chappie” on the plane from Amsterdam to Detroit. I know it didn’t get great reviews, and it’s not high art, but it brought sloppy sentimental tears to my eyes at the end anyway. But don’t take if from me, I’m a sucker.
The video above is the theme song that plays at the end, and the musicians are featured supporting characters in the film.
It does fit into the current spate of AI-fi films that have been exploring the border of intelligence, consciousness, and the promise/dangers of machine intelligence.
Fox News talking head Greg Gutfield attacked the Pope as a “Marxist” following the release of the Vatican’s message on climate change.
Gutfield then charged (at 2:20 above) that the Pope was a “Malthusian” – a follower of the 18th Century English scholar Thomas Malthus, whose predictions of doom due to over-population have been synonymous with the case for population control.
Immediately his Barbie-doll co-host protested that the word was “too big”. Greg should have taken her point.
50. Instead of resolving the problems of the poor and thinking of how the world can be different, some can only propose a reduction in the birth rate. At times, developing countries face forms of international pressure which make economic assistance contingent on certain policies of “reproductive health”. Yet “while it is true that an unequal distribution of the population and of available resources creates obstacles to development and a sustainable use of the environment, it must nonetheless be recognized that demographic growth is fully compatible with an integral and shared development”.[28] To blame population growth instead of extreme and selective consumerism on the part of some, is one way of refusing to face the issues. It is an attempt to legitimize the present model of distribution, where a minority believes that it has the right to consume in a way which can never be universalized, since the planet could not even contain the waste products of such consumption. Besides, we know that approximately a third of all food produced is discarded, and “whenever food is thrown out it is as if it were stolen from the table of the poor”.[29] Still, attention needs to be paid to imbalances in population density, on both national and global levels, since a rise in consumption would lead to complex regional situations, as a result of the interplay between problems linked to environmental pollution, transport, waste treatment, loss of resources and quality of life.
Millions of tiny red crustaceans washing ashore in Southern California – well north of their usual range. The last time this happened was 1997, right before a giant El Nino produced one of the globe’s hottest years.
This time, they aren’t the only ones who are out of place – my recent video on the “Blob” of warm water in the North Pacific shows why a number of species have moved north.
I think most observers would agree that the Pope’s message on Climate has captured the world’s attention in a big way.
The test going forward will be in how the encyclical enters the national dialogue from the pulpit. The Pope has shown that he is a moral leader not just for Catholics, but for other faiths, and even atheists.
In September, the Pontiff will address the US Congress, in what has now become an even more charged and highly anticipated event.
Who wants to see the living world destroyed? Who wants an end to birdsong, bees and coral reefs, the falcon’s stoop, the salmon’s leap? Who wants to see the soil stripped from the land, the sea rimed with rubbish?
No one. And yet it happens. Seven billion of us allow fossil fuel companies to push shut the narrow atmospheric door through which humanity stepped. We permit industrial farming to tear away the soil, banish trees from the hills, engineer another silent spring. We let the owners of grouse moors, 1% of the 1%, shoot and poison hen harriers, peregrines and eagles. We watch mutely as a small fleet of monster fishing ships trashes the oceans.
Why are the defenders of the living world so ineffective? It is partly, of course, that everyone is complicit; we have all been swept off our feet by the tide of hyperconsumption, our natural greed excited, corporate propaganda chiming with a will to believe that there is no cost. But perhaps environmentalism is also afflicted by a deeper failure: arising possibly from embarrassment or fear, a failure of emotional honesty.
I have asked meetings of green-minded people to raise their hands if they became defenders of nature because they were worried about the state of their bank accounts. Never has a hand appeared. Yet I see the same people base their appeal to others on the argument that they will lose money if we don’t protect the natural world.
Such claims are factual, but they are also dishonest: we pretend that this is what animates us, when in most cases it does not. The reality is that we care because we love. Nature appealed to our hearts, when we were children, long before it appealed to our heads, let alone our pockets. Yet we seem to believe we can persuade people to change their lives through the cold, mechanical power of reason, supported by statistics.
I see the encyclical by Pope Francis, which will be published on Thursday, as a potential turning point. He will argue that not only the physical survival of the poor, but also our spiritual welfare depends on the protection of the natural world; and in both respects he is right.
My recent video anticipated that the Pope would draw heavily for inspiration on one of the world’s most revered spiritual figures, his namesake Francis of Assisi.
10. I do not want to write this Encyclical without turning to that attractive and compelling figure, whose name I took as my guide and inspiration when I was elected Bishop of Rome. I believe that Saint Francis is the example par excellence of care for the vulnerable and of an integral ecology lived out joyfully and authentically. He is the patron saint of all who study and work in the area of ecology, and he is also much loved by non-Christians. He was particularly concerned for God’s creation and for the poor and outcast. He loved, and was deeply loved for his joy, his generous self-giving, his openheartedness. He was a mystic and a pilgrim who lived in simplicity and in wonderful harmony with God, with others, with nature and with himself. He shows us just how inseparable the bond is between concern for nature, justice for the poor, commitment to society, and interior peace.
11. Francis helps us to see that an integral ecology calls for openness to categories which transcend the language of mathematics and biology, and take us to the heart of what it is to be human. Just as happens when we fall in love with someone, whenever he would gaze at the sun, the moon or the smallest of animals, he burst into song, drawing all other creatures into his praise. He communed with all creation, even preaching to the flowers, inviting them “to praise the Lord, just as if they were endowed with reason”.[19] His response to the world around him was so much more than intellectual appreciation or economic calculus, for to him each and every creature was a sister united to him by bonds of affection. That is why he felt called to care for all that exists. His disciple Saint Bonaventure tells us that, “from a reflection on the primary source of all things, filled with even more abundant piety, he would call creatures, no matter how small, by the name of ‘brother’ or ‘sister’”.[20] Such a conviction cannot be written off as naive romanticism, for it affects the choices which determine our behaviour. If we approach nature and the environment without this openness to awe and wonder, if we no longer speak the language of fraternity and beauty in our relationship with the world, our attitude will be that of masters, consumers, ruthless exploiters, unable to set limits on their immediate needs. By contrast, if we feel intimately united with all that exists, then sobriety and care will well up spontaneously. The poverty and austerity of Saint Francis were no mere veneer of asceticism, but something much more radical: a refusal to turn reality into an object simply to be used and controlled.
12. What is more, Saint Francis, faithful to Scripture, invites us to see nature as a magnificent book in which God speaks to us and grants us a glimpse of his infinite beauty and goodness. “Through the greatness and the beauty of creatures one comes to know by analogy their maker” (Wis 13:5); indeed, “his eternal power and divinity have been made known through his works since the creation of the world” (Rom 1:20). For this reason, Francis asked that part of the friary garden always be left untouched, so that wild flowers and herbs could grow there, and those who saw them could raise their minds to God, the Creator of such beauty.[21] Rather than a problem to be solved, the world is a joyful mystery to be contemplated with gladness and praise.
The phrase “Laudato Sii” reoccurs several times in St. Francis’ Canticle of the Sun, a prayer that praises God first by thanking God for such creations as “Brother Fire” and “Sister Water.”
Written around the year 1224, the prayer is also recognized as one of the first published works of literature in the Umbrian dialect of the then-developing Italian language as opposed to Latin.
“Be praised, my Lord, through all Your creatures, especially through my lord Brother Sun,” St. Francis wrote in the third stanza of the prayer. He then continued, expressing praise to God for “Sister Moon,” “Brothers Wind and Air,” “Sister Water,” “Brother Fire, and “Mother Earth.”
“The Earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth. In many parts of the planet, the elderly lament that once beautiful landscapes are now covered with rubbish.”
“Never have we so hurt and mistreated our common home as we have in the last 200 years.”
“A very solid scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a disturbing warming of the climatic system. … A number of scientific studies indicate that most global warming in recent decades is due to the great concentration of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen oxides and others) released mainly as a result of human activity.”
“We are not God. The Earth was here before us and was given to us.”
Press conference packed.
“The climate is a common good, belonging to all and meant for all.”
“The exploitation of the planet has already exceeded acceptable limits and we still have not solved the problem of poverty.”
“Doomsday predictions can no longer be met with irony or disdain.”
France has long been at the forefront of nuclear power as one of the biggest users around the world. But the recent announcement that French nuclear giant Areva would merge its reactor business with fellow French giant EDF is a sign of changing times in the industry.
Both EDF and Areva are more than 80% owned by the French government, so essentially both companies are largely beholden to the will of the state. That reality was reflected by the fact that the French President’s office actually made the merger announcement.
French state-owned companies are not widely regarded as being paragons of efficiency and the involvement of the state certainly complicates the typical profit motive of these firms. Areva is no exception to that rule as the company lost a total of $5.6 billion in 2014, an amount that is larger than the company’s market capitalization.
But the problems are bigger than Areva. The nuclear industry faces exorbitant plant costs, waves of protests, and constant construction delays whenever a new reactor breaks ground. The US and France have historically been the leaders in nuclear power with the largest fleets in the West. But even in France and the US, the time, cost, and difficulty of building new nuclear plants resulted in limited construction in recent decades. Add that to the fact that electric power demand is stagnant, and it becomes clear that the industry is decaying in the West.
Instead most of the growth in the nuclear power industry is occurring in two countries with some of the worst environmental and safety records in the world; China and India. Both countries have enormous plans in the works for an expansion of nuclear power in part as a mechanism to curb the use of coal that leads to horrific air pollution. Still with quality concerns regarding the necessary high tech safety equipment, the two nations will need to be very diligent given the risks associated with nuclear power plant operations.
Areva has posted losses in each of the past four years including a €4.83 billion loss in 2014. Chief executive Philippe Varin said: “Areva’s paradox is that it is a world leader in its sector and a company in crisis.” Varin said the crisis was due to deficient management of big reactor projects and Areva’s failure to adapt to a weaker global market following the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
Areva’s spent nuclear fuel reprocessing operations are in trouble. A May 6 Reuters article outlines the problems. Areva’s reprocessing unit has lost nearly all of its international customers and now relies almost exclusively on domestic business. The company’s ‘back-end’ sales − reprocessing and decommissioning − have fallen from €2 billion in 2004 to €1.53 billion in 2014. Areva needs to invest something of the order of €200 million per year for the next 10 years to renew ageing equipment and boost capacity of its nuclear waste storage pools.
But Areva’s biggest problems involve its European Pressurised Reactors (EPR). These were the first Generation III reactor types to win orders, first in Finland in 2003 (Olkiluoto 3 − the first reactor order in Western Europe in 15 years), France in 2006 (Flamanville) and China in 2007 (two EPRs at Taishan).
Since then, EPRs have faced one problem after another. All three EPR construction projects have suffered cost blowouts or delays or both.
U.S. energy companies are taking their foot off the natural-gas pedal, slowing down their production growth after years of furious pumping.
In the past eight years, a combination of improvements in drilling techniques and high energy prices stoked natural-gas production to all-time highs. The boom quickly sent natural-gas prices to historic lows, but output kept rising because high oil prices made it profitable for producers to keep tapping fields that yielded both oil and gas.
Now, the global collapse in oil prices has producers and analysts rethinking the gas boom, too. Both gas and oil prices are down about 40% in the past year, cutting the incentive to keep drilling. A flurry of recent forecasts from government and private-sector experts suggest monthly gas production will flatten and possibly even begin to decline in 2015.
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Natural-gas producers have defied predictions of slowing output growth before, and they would probably get back to work quickly if either gas or oil prices embarked on a sustained rally.
But some analysts say the current downshift in natural-gas production is more widespread than in previous slumps.
“The big fat difference is that [drilling] activity is down in every corner, from every entity that you can think of,” said Jan Stuart, global energy economist at Credit Suisse.
Mr. Stuart’s estimates indicate that U.S. gas output hit an all-time peak in December and will decline throughout 2015. Department of Energy data released at the end of May showed natural-gas output growth in the first quarter at its slowest since the fourth quarter of 2013.
“If you believe that U.S. oil production is peaking, then you would see a similar knock-on impact to gas,” said Greg Sharenow, a portfolio manager at Pacific Investment Management Co., one of the firms to bet on rising prices later this year. “It’s the same companies and the same economics being challenged from both sides.” Pimco has about $20 billion invested in commodities.
Gas production is being impacted by the downturn in Shale oil drilling – which has been in effect, subsidizing low gas prices with gas production coincident to the shale drilling process. The WSJ article points out, “Higher prices for oil and other liquid fuels including ethane and propane effectively subsidized gas drilling, Credit Suisse told investors in a presentation last month.” Continue reading “Are Oil and Gas Both Peaking?”
