GREEN GUIDE S P E C I A L E N V I R O N M E N T I S S U E S

-------------------------------------------------
Natural gas a weak weapons against climate change
-------------------------------------------------
Texas and Antarctica attacked, Rocks hint
-------------------------------------------------
2011 Among Hottest years, marked by extreme weathers
-------------------------------------------------
Planting Wind Energy on Farms May Help Farmers
-------------------------------------------------
With Gas Prices High, U.S. Refinery Closures Hit Workers and Drivers

How to Win the War On GLOBAL WARMING

NATURAL GAS WEAK WEAPONS AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE

Nathan Myhrvold found "some really counterintuitive results" when he and study coauthor Ken Caldeira set out to see what the climate effect would be if the world switched from coal power plants (like the one seen above in West Virginia) to natural gas and other sources.

INDEX

-------------------------------------------------
Natural gas a weak weapons against climate change pg 3

-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------
2011 Among Hottest years, marked by extreme weathers pg 8

-------------------------------------------------
Texas and Antarctica attacked, Rocks hint pg 4

-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------
Planting Wind Energy on Farms May Help Farmers pg 5

-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------
With Gas Prices High, U.S. Refinery Closures Hit Workers and Drivers pg 10

Although natural gas burns more cleanly than coal, a new study argues that replacing all the world's coal power plants with natural gas would do little to slow global warming this century.
"There are lots of reasons to like natural gas, but climate change isn't one of them," said physicist Nathan Myhrvold, lead author of the new study. "It's worthless for [fighting] climate change, as far as we can tell."
The reason for that grim assessment: The carbon dioxide burden already is so large, and its lifetime in the atmosphere is so long, that even a switch to completely carbon-free electricity couldn't stop temperatures from rising over the next 100 years. Switching from coal to natural gas would cut the warming effect in 100 years' time by only about 20 percent, while switching to renewable or nuclear energy would slash the warming effect about two-thirds to three-quarter

TEXAS AND ANTARCTICA ATTACKED, rocks hint

About 1.1 billion years ago, what are now El Paso, Texas, and Antarctica appear to have existed side by side, scientists say

About 1.1 billion years ago, what are now El Paso, Texas, and Antarctica appear to have existed side by side, scientists say.
The find is part of a decades-long effort to piece together fragments of an ancient supercontinent that existed before Pangaea.
"Most people are familiar with Pangaea," said study co-author Staci Loewy, a geochemist at California State University, Bakersfield. "That was a supercontinent that formed 300 million years ago."
(See "Supercontinent Pangaea Pushed, Not Sucked, Into Place.")
Pangaea began to break apart about 225 million years ago due to geological processes related to plate tectonics, which eventually spread Earth's landmasses into the continents we see today.
The supercontinent's pieces can be reassembled by tracing ancient mountain belts and other geologic patterns—such as the Appalachian Mountains, which are geologically related to mountains of England and Scandinavia.
America's corn belt overlaps with its central "wind belt"—a wide swath of the midsection of the United States that is ideal for wind energy development-an intersection that could be good news for corn, new research suggests.
In traditional agriculture in many places, farmers grow trees along the edges of fields, a technique that slows the wind and stirs up the air, benefiting the crops in the field.
-------------------------------------------------
PLANTING WIND ENERGY ON FARMS MAY HELP FARMERS
-------------------------------------------------

Now researchers are studying whether wind turbines can have a similar effect—actually helping crops to grow.

With the tremendous growth in wind energy in the past decade, turbines often have been planted in or near cropland—leading both farmers and researchers to wonder what effect the rotating blades might have on corn, soy, and other crops.

Some of the leading research is under way in the U.S. Midwest, heartland of the world's leading corn-producing nation, a place where blustery fields have beenideal for siting wind energy farms. The findings here could apply to many places around the world, wherever turbines and farms are near each other, although the effects on vegetation may vary by region or by crop.

2011 AMONG THE HOTTEST YEARS, Marked by EXTREME WEATHERS

An animation still using satellite data shows Arctic sea ice melt during the summer of 2011.

This year is shaping up to be one of the ten hottest years on record, according to a United Nations report announced yesterday.
Likewise, 2011 may be the hottest year on record during La Niña, a periodic cooling of the eastern tropical Pacific.
That's a bad sign, since La Niña years are generally relatively cool, said Steven Running, a professor of ecology at the University of Montana, who was not part of the study team.
So the new finding suggests that La Niña conditions that once produced strong global cooling now only slightly affect the overall temperature trend, Running said by email.
"What does it take now to have a cooling cycle?" he asked. "And what will happen in the next strong El Niño?"

WITH GAS PRICES HIGH, U.S. REFINARY CLOSURES HIT WORKERS and DRIVERS

Sunoco's Philadelphia refinery stands on the banks of the Schuylkill River. If a buyer for the refinery is not found, it will be shut down this summer.

Its tanks and endless mazes of pipes, its smokestacks and its smells have long dominated the urban plain where the Schuylkill River spills into the Delaware. At 1,400 acres (566 hectares), it covers more land area than the original settlement of Philadelphia. And it has pumped fuel and money into that city-and far beyond-for so long that its owners reckon it is the oldest continuously operating oil refinery in the United States.
But Sunoco's storied South Philadelphia refinery may be cooking its final barrels.
Sunoco is getting out of the refining business. If a buyer is not found for the sprawling facility, it will be shut down on July 1, just like the company's other old refinery 12 miles to the south, Marcus Hook, which was idled in December. Several weeks later, ConocoPhillips closed its adjacent refinery on the Delaware River. Together, the three refineries employed 1,200 workers represented by the United Steelworkers of America and nearly as many salaried and contract workers. They manufactured 50 percent of the petroleum fuels produced on the East Coast of the United States.
The closures and potential closure mark a profound change taking place in the oil business, where tremendous divides have opened up between the prices of different grades of crude oil extracted from different locations on the globe. The new economics have translated into huge profits for some, and punishing losses for others, depending on their place in the pitiless energy production chain.

THERE IS STILL HOPE

This year is shaping up to be one of the ten hottest years on record, according to a United Nations report announced yesterday.
Likewise, 2011 may be the hottest year on record during La Niña, a periodic cooling of the eastern tropical Pacific.
That's a bad sign, since La Niña years are generally relatively cool, said Steven Running, a professor of ecology at the University of Montana, who was not part of the study team.
So the new finding suggests that La Niña conditions that once produced strong global cooling now only slightly affect the overall temperature trend, Running said by email.
"What does it take now to have a cooling cycle?" he asked. "And what will happen in the next strong El Niño?"