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Dear friends,
Below are
many highly revealing one-paragraph excerpts of important global warming
articles from the mainstream media.
Though many politicians and
oil executives long denied the existence of global warming, most
scientists now agree that it is one of the greatest challenges facing our
planet. The below articles shed light on this most important
topic and how it has been covered up. Links are provided to the full
articles on major media websites. If any link should fail to function, click here. By
choosing to educate ourselves on these important issues and to spread the word, we
can and will build a
brighter future.
With
best wishes,
Tod Fletcher and Fred
Burks
for PEERS and the WantToKnow.info Team
ExxonMobil tried to mislead, scientists
say2007-01-04, Boston
Globe/Associated Presshttp://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/01/04/exxonmobil_tried_to_...
ExxonMobil
Corp. gave $16 million to 43 ideological groups between 1998 and 2005 in
an
effort to mislead the public by discrediting the science behind global
warming, the Union of Concerned Scientists asserted yesterday.The report by the advocacy group mirrors similar claims by Britain's
leading scientific academy. Last September, The Royal Society wrote the
oil company asking it to halt support for groups that "misrepresented the
science of climate change." Alden Meyer, the Union of Concerned
Scientists' strategy and policy director, said in a teleconference that
ExxonMobil based its tactics on those of tobacco companies, spreading
uncertainty by misrepresenting peer-reviewed scientific studies or
emphasizing only selected facts. James McCarthy, a professor at Harvard
University, said the company has sought to "create the illusion of a
vigorous debate" about global warming.
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[url=]
Dirty Secret: Green Cars Automakers Won't Sell
You[/url][url=]
2007-09-01,
msn.com[/url]http://autos.msn.com/advice/article.aspx?contentid=4024974
On a
recent run from Boston to Cape Cod, I test drove the 2008 Honda Accord,
the latest version of this family favorite. The new Accord boasts an
environmental first: a six-cylinder gasoline engine that's cleaner than
many hybrid systems. There's only one catch: You can't actually buy this
ultra-green Accord, or the four-cylinder version that also produces
near-zero pollution. That is, unless you live in California, New York or
six other northeast states that follow California's tougher pollution
rules. Only there can you buy this Accord, or the roughly two dozen other
models that meet so-called Partial Zero Emissions Vehicle standards, PZEV
for short. Not only can't you buy one, but the government says
it's currently illegal for automakers to sell these green cars
outside of the special states. Under terms of the Clean Air Act - in the
kind of delicious irony only our government can pull off - anyone
(dealer,
consumer, automaker) involved in an out-of-bounds PZEV sale could be
subject to civil fines of up to $27,500. Volvo sent its dealers
a
memo alerting them to this fact, noting that its greenest S40 and V50
models were only for the special states. So, just how green is a PZEV
machine? Well, if you just cut your lawn with a gas mower,
congratulations, you just put out more pollution in one hour than these
cars do in 2,000 miles of driving. Grill a single juicy burger, and
you've
cooked up the same hydrocarbon emissions as a three-hour drive in a Ford
Focus PZEV. As the California Air Resources Board has noted, the tailpipe
emissions of these cars can be cleaner than the outside air in smoggy
cities. PZEV models are already available from Toyota, Ford, Honda, GM,
Subaru, Volvo and VW. But chances are, you've never heard of them.
Note:For many exciting articles about new, efficient and clean energy
inventions, click
here.
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[url=]
Climate Experts Worry as 2006 Is Hottest Year
on
Record in U.S.[/url][url=]
2007-01-10,
Washington Post[/url]http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/09/AR20070109019...
Last year
was
the warmest in the continental United States in the past 112 years --
capping a nine-year warming streak "unprecedented in the historical
record" that was driven in part by the burning of fossil fuels, the
government reported yesterday. According to the government's National
Climatic Data Center, the record-breaking warmth -- which caused
daffodils
and cherry trees to bloom throughout the East on New Year's Day -- was
the
result of both unusual regional weather patterns and the long-term
effects
of the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The center said there
are indications that the rate at which global temperatures are rising is
speeding up. Average temperatures nationwide in 2006 were 2.2 degrees
Fahrenheit higher than the mean temperatures nationwide for the 20th
century. Climate experts generally do not make much of temperature
fluctuations over one or two years, but ... the record 2006 temperatures
were part of a long and worrisome trend. For instance, NOAA said, the
past
nine years have all been among the 25 warmest years on record for the
continental United States. Brenda Ekwurzel, a climate scientist with the
Union of Concerned Scientists [said]
"when you look at
temperatures across the globe, every single year since 1993 has been in
the top 20 warmest years on record." Globally, 2005 was the
hottest year on record ... and 2006 was slightly cooler.
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Bribes offered to scientists[/url][url=]
2007-02-03, Sydney Morning
Herald
(Australia's leading newspaper)[/url]http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/bribes-offered-to-scientists/2007/02/0...
Scientists
and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by
one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine the UN climate
change report. Letters sent by the American Enterprise
Institute,
an ExxonMobil-funded think tank with close links to the Bush
Administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the
shortcomings of the report. Travel expenses and additional payments were
also offered. The institute has received more than $1.6 million from
ExxonMobil - which yesterday announced a $50 billion annual profit, the
biggest ever by a US company - and more than 20 of its staff have worked
as consultants to the Bush Administration. A former head of ExxonMobil,
Lee Raymond, is the vice-chairman of the institute's board of trustees.
Note:Why wasn't this important story covered by any
major media in the U.S.? For an answer, click here.
Cheap solar power poised to undercut oil and
gas
by half2007-02-18,
The
Telegraph (One of the U.K.'s leading newspapers)http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/02/19/ccview19.xml
Within
five years, solar power will be cheap enough to compete with
carbon-generated electricity. In a decade, the cost may have
fallen so dramatically that solar cells could undercut oil, gas, coal and
nuclear power by up to half. Anil Sethi, the chief executive of the Swiss
start-up company Flisom,
says he looks forward to the day - not so far off - when entire cities in
America and Europe generate their heating, lighting and air-conditioning
needs from solar films on buildings with enough left over to feed a
surplus back into the grid. The secret? A piece of dark polymer foil, as
thin as a sheet of paper. It is so light it can be stuck to the sides of
buildings. It can be mass-produced in cheap rolls like packaging - in any
colour. The "tipping point" will arrive when the capital cost of solar
power falls below $1 (51p) per watt, roughly the cost of carbon power.
The
best options today vary from $3 to $4 per watt - down from $100 in the
late
1970s. Mr Sethi believes his product will cut the cost to 80 cents per
watt
within five years, and 50 cents in a decade.
"We don't need
subsidies, we just need governments to get out of the way and do no
harm,"
he said. Solar use [has] increased dramatically in Japan and
above
all Germany, where Berlin's green energy law passed in 2004 forces the
grid
to buy surplus electricity from households at a fat premium. The tipping
point in Germany and Japan came once households [understood] that they
could undercut their unloved utilities. Credit Lyonnais believes the rest
of the world will soon join the stampede.
Needless to say,
electricity utilities are watching the solar revolution with
horror.Note:Why is this inspiring, important news getting so little press coverage?
And
why not more solar subsidies? For a possible answer, click here. For an
amazing new energy source not yet reported in the major media which could
make even solar energy obsolete, click
here.
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Scientists muzzled, Congress told[/url][url=]
2007-03-21, Sydney Morning
Herald
(Australia's leading newspaper)[/url]http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/scientists-muzzled/2007/03/20/11741530...
The Bush
Administration has run a systematic campaign to play down the dangers of
climate change, demanding hundreds of politically motivated changes to
scientific reports and muzzling a pre-eminent expert on global warming,
the US Congress has been told. The testimony ... painted the
Administration as determined to maintain its line on climate change even
when it clashed with the findings of scientific experts. The
Administration has moved to exercise control over environmental agencies
by installing political appointees including a former oil industry
lobbyist, Philip Cooney, as chief of staff of the Council on
Environmental
Quality.
In 2003 Mr Cooney and other senior appointed officials
made at least 181 changes to a strategic plan on climate change to play
down the scientific consensus on global warming. They made a
further 113 alterations to minimise the human role in climate change.
"These changes must be made," a note in Mr Cooney's handwriting says.
Under heated questioning, Mr Cooney admitted the changes were all
intended
to cast doubt on the impact of global warming. Control from the White
House became the norm, [NASA's Dr. James] Hansen told the committee.
"Scientific press releases were going to the White House for editing," he
said. "It's very unfortunate that we developed this politicisation of
science. The public relations office should be staffed by expert
appointees - otherwise they become offices of propaganda." Hansen was
also restrained from giving press interviews by a junior political
appointee, George Deutsch. Mr Deutsch left NASA early last year after it
emerged he had falsified his CV.
Lun 29 Oct - 11:11 par mihou