Earth ChangesS


Hardhat

North Dakota oil industry trying to preserve cash by changing radioactive waste disposal laws

Ernest Scheyder
Reuters
Wed, 28 Jan 2015 17:29 UTC
used radioactive filter sock
© REUTERS/Andrew CullenAn environmental group employee holds a used filter sock in Bismarck, North Dakota January 27, 2015.
North Dakota's oil industry is pushing to change the state's radioactive waste disposal laws as part of a broad effort to conserve cash as oil prices tumble.

The waste, which becomes slightly radioactive as part of the hydraulic fracturing process that churns up isotopes locked underground, must be trucked out of state. That's because rules prohibit North Dakota landfills from accepting anything but miniscule amounts of radiation.

The most common form of radioactive waste is a filter sock, a mesh tube resembling a sandbag through which fracking water is pumped before it's injected back into the earth. Tank and pipeline sludge are also radioactive.

It's not clear how much of this waste is generated, as North Dakota officials only began requiring tracking last year; final 2014 reports aren't due until next month. Some put the number at 70 tons per day; others say 27 tons.

Comment: The oil industry in North Dakota has been having trouble finding adequate methods of disposing of radioactive waste. The industry has also been plagued by numerous oil spills that industry and state executives attempted to hide from the public. It has been reported that the industry in North Dakota is running wild with little regulatory oversight, and as oil prices plummet and profits dwindle, things don't look promising where safety and health issues are concerned.

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Wolf

Coyotes kill police horse in Lapeer County, Michigan

Roberto Acosta
mlive.com
Mon, 26 Jan 2015 15:43 UTC
Image
This photo shows a coyote that was spotted on the same farm where a horse from the Lapeer County Sheriff's Mounted Division was attacked and killed Sunday, Jan. 25 near the Lapeer-Oakland County border.
A Lapeer County Sheriff's Mounted Division Horse was attacked and killed Sunday, Jan. 25, by a pack of coyotes, not far from a home, a lieutenant said.

The attack took place around 3 p.m. on a farm near the area of East Oakwood and Hosner roads along the Lapeer-Oakland County border, said Lt. Bruce Osmon, head of the mounted unit.

Osmon said the horse was feeding around 20 feet from a barn and 70 feet from a home.

"All of a sudden (the owners) heard a commotion," he said.

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Butterfly

Monarch butterflies are rebounding in Mexico but numbers are still low

Mark Stevenson
myway
Tue, 27 Jan 2015 11:58 UTC
monarch butterflies
© creationrevolution.comDestination reached.
The number of Monarch butterflies that reached wintering grounds in Mexico has rebounded 69 percent from last year's lowest-on-record levels, but their numbers remain very low, according to the World Wildlife Fund.

Last year, the Monarchs covered only 1.65 acres (0.67 hectares), the smallest area since record-keeping began in 1993. This year, the butterflies rebounded, to cover 2.79 acres (1.13 hectares), according to a formal census by Mexican environmental authorities and scientists released Tuesday.

The orange-and-black butterflies are suffering from loss of milkweed habitat in the United States, illegal logging in Mexico and climate change. Each year, the butterflies make a migration from Canada to Mexico and find the same pine and fir forests to spend the winter, even though no butterfly lives to make the round trip.

"Of course it is good news that the forest area occupied by Monarchs this season increased," said Omar Vidal, head of the World Wildlife Fund in Mexico. "But let's be crystal clear, 1.13 hectares is very, very low, and it is still the second-smallest forest surface occupied by this butterfly in 22 years of monitoring."

At their peak in 1996, the Monarchs covered more than 44.5 acres (18 hectares) in the mountains west of Mexico City.

Comment: Agricultural fields used to be an important source of milkweed for monarch caterpillars. Milkweed has historically grown alongside crop plants, and provided abundant food for monarch caterpillars. With the introduction of herbicide tolerant crops, management shifted from a till-based approach to the widespread use of herbicides. This practice has diminished much of the milkweed growing in agricultural areas, since milkweed can survive some tilling, but cannot survive herbicides. In addition, chemicals kill monarch larvae so the avoidance of pesticides and herbicides may help restore the monarch populations. What are the chances we can accomplish this "butterfly effect?"

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Cloud Precipitation

Flooding hits parts of Massachusetts coast after winter storm Juno

Richard Davies
floodlist.com
Wed, 28 Jan 2015 14:20 UTC
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© U.S. Army National Guard photo by 1st Sgt. Don Veitch, Massachusetts National Guard Public AffairsFlooded ares of Scituate, Jan. 27, 2015.
Winter storm Juno hit the eastern US states of Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine with 75 mph winds and 30 inches of snow. Snowfall amounts, travel bans and power outages and have all been well reported in US media.

The storm also brought flooding to some coastal areas, with the coastal areas of Massachusetts worst hit. Areas along the eastern Massachusetts coast,south of Boston, including north and northeast facing shorelines of Cape Cod and Nantucket faced some of the highest waves and storm surges. NWS warned that floods could reach 3 feet high in places.

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Attention

2.9 magnitude earthquake and 'boom sound' in Hampshire, England


BBC News
Tue, 27 Jan 2015 23:38 UTC
Image
The epicentre of the quake was at Headbourne Worthy, just north of Winchester
An earthquake with a magnitude of 2.9 has been recorded in Hampshire, the British Geological Survey has confirmed.

Postings on social media reported buildings in the Winchester area shaking following a tremor shortly after 18:30 GMT.

A police spokeswoman said no injuries or serious damage had been reported.

Matthew Emery, from South Wonston, near Winchester described the experience as "almost as if Concorde had flown over".

The British Geological Survey (Bgs) reported a tremor at a depth of 3km (1.9miles) at Headbourne Worthy, just north east of Winchester.

BGS Seismologist David Galloway said the UK experienced about 10 quakes of such a size each year which were "usually quite widely felt around the area".
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Attention

Series of dead and stranded bottlenose dolphins in the Philippines

Gabriel Cardinoza
newsinfo.inquirer.net
Tue, 27 Jan 2015 11:02 UTC
Image
© Flickr/Jeffk42.
Two bottlenose dolphins were found dead at the Tondaligan Beach here and on the shores of neighboring Binmaley town in Pangasinan province, in what has turned out to be a series of beaching in Lingayen Gulf since Monday.

Westly Rosario, chief of the National Integrated Fisheries Technology Development Center (NIFTDC) here, said one more dolphin was found dying at about 6 a.m. at the Lingayen beach in Lingayen town.

At 5:30 p.m. on Monday, Rosario said another dolphin beached just at the shoreline at the back of the NIFTDC.

Two more dolphins were found on the shores of the island village of Pugaro here at about 8 p.m. on the same day.
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Red Flag

6 unprovoked shark attacks off Californian coast in 2014

Veronica Rocha
Los Angeles Times
Mon, 26 Jan 2015 23:14 UTC
Image
© David Fleetham / Discovery ChannelThough being attacked by a shark like this great white is extremely unlikely, the number of unprovoked shark attacks worldwide has grown at a steady pace since 1900. According to the Florida Museum of Natural History, there were 39 reported shark attacks in California from 2001 to 2013.
A recent report says there were six unprovoked shark attacks along the U.S. Pacific Coast in 2014. All of them were in California, and all the sharks were great whites.

Four of the attacks occurred in October, one in July and another in December, according to the Shark Research Committee's recently released 2014 report. Remarkably, in all attacks, only two surfers were injured.

"I am surprised we don't have more of them," said Ralph Collier, the shark expert and researcher who wrote the report, which specifically looks at attacks that were deemed not to be provoked by humans.

Last July's shark attack in Manhattan Beach, for example, was not included. In that attack, long-distance swimmer Steve Robles was bitten by a 7-foot juvenile shark.
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Arrow Down

Family of 5 escapes car swallowed by sinkhole in Bladensburg, Maryland

Zoe Szathmary
Daily Mail, UK
Tue, 27 Jan 2015 21:51 UTC
Image
A sinkhole on a Maryland road Tuesday morning almost completely absorbed a family's car
A sinkhole gobbled up one family's car in Maryland on Tuesday morning.

Darwin Mendoza says he was in the car with his 8-year-old son, and two daughters, a 4-year-old and a 6-month-old baby, when it hit the hole as he was backing out of his driveway. The hole was hidden by water.

Mendoza says at first, only one tire sank, and that he and his children got out of the car. They then watched as the sinkhole got bigger and swallowed the car whole.

'They were running to leave. Thank God they didn't put their seat belts on. It helped them get out of the car,' neighbor Luz Martinez told NBC Washington.

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Snowflake Cold

Powerful snowstorm buries New England, cuts off Nantucket

Katharine Q. Seelye and Jess Bidgood
New York Times
Tue, 27 Jan 2015 20:32 UTC
Image
© Dominick Reuter/Reuters.
The first major storm of the winter blasted across eastern New England on Tuesday, unleashing whiteout conditions driven by gale-force winds that pelted faces like small icy daggers and made cars disappear under igloo-like formations.

The storm may not have lived up to its billing in New York City, but it more than delivered in New England. It cut off the island of Nantucket, where almost all 12,000 year-round residents lost power and telephone service, and it flooded the Atlantic coastal town of Scituate, where a car floated downtown.

As snow continued to swirl Tuesday afternoon, forecasters were still expecting the predicted two to three feet. In Shrewsbury, about 40 miles west of Boston, 31 inches had fallen by 10 a.m.; Worcester, nearby, had received 26 inches and was on track to break records.

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Cloud Precipitation

Flooding displaces 3,000 in San Martín, Peru

Richard Davies
floodlist.com
Tue, 27 Jan 2015 20:15 UTC
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© Government of San Martin, PeruOverflowing river Huallaga, San Martin, Peru.
According to Peru's Civil Defense Institute (INDECI), around 3,000 people from 690 families have been forced from their homes after several days of heavy rain caused flooding in areas of San Martin region, northern Peru. Peru's central government has since declared a state of emergency in the region.

The heavy rain caused the Huallaga and Huayabamba rivers to overflow, inundating around 3,000 hectares of farmland, as well as causing damage to homes and property.

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