Imagine a mass the size of Manhattan breaking off a mountain and falling into the ocean. It’s an event few have witnessed, but nature photographer James Balog and his crew got to see just that while filming a new documentary about the waning of glaciers across the globe.
That film, ‘Chasing Ice,’ is screening at the SXSW Film Festival in Austin, Texas this week. It provides a fascinating glimpse into the rapid recession of glaciers in the face of climate change. Balog and his team capture intense moments where gigantic pieces of glaciers “calve,” or break off into the sea.
But even more fascinating is a robust effort by Balog to capture over time the disappearance of the glaciers. Using dozens of digital cameras powered by miniature solar panels, the photographer and his team set up glacier monitoring stations (in some very remote, treacherous locations) that took a picture of each glacier every day. They called it the Extreme Ice Survey. Even in the span of one year, the regression is stark. Seen over several years, it’s even more so. Edited together, the images show huge masses of ice slowly deflating like a balloon. (And there are helpful visual comparisons in the film to show the scale of just how much regression has occurred.) In some cases, the crew have to hike back to their cameras to pan, as the glaciers have disappeared so much that they’re no longer in view. Continue Reading →
Photo by Flickr user Stuck in Customs/Creative Commons
Pipeline companies are finding themselves with a new obstacle: defenders of private property rights.
Once again, the farmer fighting the Keystone XL pipeline has had her restraining order against the company behind the pipeline dissolved. You can read the ruling by the Sixth Court of Appeals in Texarkana, below.
The court says in the new decision that they had reinstated the restraining order “in an abundance of caution” and now that they’ve had time to review the appeal, they believe the it should be dissolved. Continue Reading →
Did it seem windy to you last night? Because at 8:41 p.m. Wednesday, the Texas grid set a new record for wind power generation, reaching 7,599 megawatts.
The previous record was set the day before, with 7,403 megawatts. Before that, the biggest day of wind power generation in Texas was Oct. 7, 2011, with 7,400 megawatts of power.
When the record was reached, wind was supplying 22 percent of the grid’s power. That’s not actually a record, it got up to 26 percent last December.
The wind power was partly from the coast, but most of it came from West and North Texas. Continue Reading →
The progress of the drought: Beginning, Peak and Now
It’s time for another update on the Texas drought from the U.S. Drought Monitor, published every Thursday morning. And sadly, the pattern of regression we’ve seen over the past few months has taken a slight step back. The numbers:
Nearly 21 percent of the state is in the worst level of drought, “exceptional.” That’s 6 percent more of the state since last week. Much of that increase has taken place in Southwest Texas, in Brewster, Jeff Davis and Presidio Counties.
While more of the state is in “exceptional” drought, it’s important to remember that at the peak of the drought in October, 86 percent of the state was at this level. “Exceptional” drought, according to the monitor, means “exceptional and widespread crop [and] pasture losses; shortages of water in reservoirs, streams, and wells creating water emergencies.” Continue Reading →
Image by NASA/Solar Dynamics Observatory via Getty Images
A solar storm is headed towards earth, but Texas grid operators aren't worried.
One of the biggest solar storms in five years is headed toward Earth. The Space Weather Prediction Center says it could affect power grids, GPS signals and even some airplane flights.
But power grid operators in Texas aren’t expecting much effect. Dottie Roark, spokesperson for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which manages the electric grid for much of the state, says not to worry.
“Solar storms are mainly a factor in the upper latitudes because the Earth’s magnetic field acts as a shield against this type of solar weather,” she told StateImpact Texas collaborator KUT News. “So that shield is weakest at the north pole and the south pole, so that’s why it may affect some of the high latitudes more than here in our region.” Continue Reading →
Covar began his career in state government when he clerked for Chairman Dennis Bonnen (State Representative District 25) on the House Environmental Regulation Committee. From 2005 to 2007, Covar also worked as the environmental and natural resource adviser to Governor Rick Perry. In this role, Covar was responsible for advising the governor and senior staff on all major budget and policy issues pertaining to the TCEQ, the Texas Railroad Commission, and Texas Parks and Wildlife. Continue Reading →
Vampire Weekend catches a big break at SXSW in 2008
Hordes of techies, musicians and film buffs are packing their bags for the SXSW Interactive, Film and Music conferences that get rolling this week. 286,000 people attended SXSW events last year, and even more are expected this year.
So what kind of effect does that have on the city’s energy use and grid? Austin’s population is around 800,000, so you’re looking at an additional 35 percent of population that needs power, at least temporarily. And you could argue that this is a particularly power-hungry bunch, with Interactive attendees charging phones and powering laptops, Film folks running projectors and Music venues staying open longer and later than usual.
But if you ask Austin Energy, the city-owned utility that powers Austin, the 10-day festival doesn’t make a big dent in the city’s overall energy use. “It’s no more than any other event,” Larry Weis, General Manager for Austin Energy, says. “I don’t think we’re going to see anything unusual.”
Weis points out that in many instances, portable generators are used to set up power at temporary venues, since that’s easier than setting up a temporary utility pole that hooks into the downtown grid. Continue Reading →
Director of Public Citizen Texas Tom "Smitty" Smith.
Yana Skorobogatov of StateImpact Texas researched and reported this article.
At a public hearing today in Austin, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality heard from groups worried about proposed changes to the way the state agency tracks emissions and pollution by companies. A proposal before the Commission as part of the state’s sunset review process would change the criteria for businesses to qualify for environmental permits.
Tom “Smitty” Smith, director of Public Citizen Texas, says the new rules could move businesses with poor histories of environmental compliance into the same category as businesses with average or high compliance. “It’s kind of like grading on the curve, and changing the curve to make sure that more people pass the exams and are given privileges that they perhaps don’t deserve,” he told StateImpact Texas.
A TCEQspokesman said the rule change is meant to create incentives to encourage voluntary compliance with environmental regulations. In a statement to StateImpact Texas, the spokesperson said that “the proposed rulemaking modifies the components and formula of compliance history in order to provide a more accurate measure of regulated entities’ performance and make compliance history a more effective regulatory tool.”
The three-person governing commission will close comment on the proposal on March 12, and it will go before the commission for a vote this summer, according to the TCEQ.
How do you get eminent domain in Texas? Just check a box.
Texas is a state that prides itself on its independent spirit and rugged individualism, particularly the rights of landowners to use their land as they please. But it’s also a state that has a long history of drilling for oil and gas and a tradition of cooperation with the industry. Where the two traditions intersect, and at times collide, is when the oil and gas industry needs private land for their projects. That’s been the case in two instances recently, both involving pipelines and farmers.
One involves a rice farmer that didn’t want a carbon dioxide pipeline on his land, which went all the way to the Supreme Court of Texas. They sided with the landowner in that case. In the other, a farmer in northeast Texas is fighting an eminent domain claim by the company behind the Keystone XL pipeline. That pipeline would go through her farm, and today the head of the company behind it, TransCanada, announced that they intended to start construction as early as this spring on the section from Cushing, Oklahoma to Port Arthur, Texas.
In both cases, the companies claimed they had eminent domain to build their pipelines on the respective properties because they were “common carrier” pipelines, which would be used to transport oil and gas from other companies in addition to their own.
But who decides if the pipeline deserves that status? In essence, the companies do. Continue Reading →
Stacy Martin hopes community college course will lead to a better job
If you want to see where the best job prospects are, look who’s putting in the overtime. In Houston, the world’s energy capital where new finds in oil and gas are boosting the economy, it’s workers in manufacturing.
“Right now, the way we’re growing is we’re working people longer hours, the people who have the skills,” said Patrick Jankowski, an economist with the Greater Houston Partnership, a group that promotes the city’s businesses.
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