Planet in Peril (PinP) where science gets respect!

SCIENCE MAGAZINE - BIODIVERSITY Edited by Jeffrey Brainard In a victory for conservation, the Cambodian government announced on 18 March that it is suspending for 10 years plans to build two hydropower dams on the Mekong River. The move helps preserve a freshwater ecosystem that, after the Amazon, is the world’s most biologically diverse. It also supports a vast fishing industry. Cambodia now relies on hydropower for nearly 50% of its electricity, but will turn to coal, natural gas, and solar energy to meet its future power needs. The Mekong begins on the Tibetan Plateau and flows through several countries, including Cambodia and Vietnam, before emptying into the South China Sea. It has been under increasing pressure from development, pollution, and climate change; drought and upstream dams in China have exacerbated recent low water levels in the lower Mekong. Adding to the river system’s woes, Laos opened two hydropower dams on the Mekong’s main branch in the past 6 months, an

Winnipeg, March 23, 2016 – Green Party of Manitoba Energy advocate for Conservation and Water Stewardship, David Nickarz, says that a Green government would reject all projects associated with construction of the proposed Energy East pipeline. The Green Party of Manitoba (GPM) thinks that Manitoba Hydro would help Manitobans more by investing in energy retrofitting and development of solar production, rather than quietly preparing to sell hydroelectric power to the Energy East pipeline,” Nickarz said.

NATIONAL OBSERVER Alberta Premier Rachel Notley announced today that she is imposing a limit on oil sands emissions and phasing out all coal power usage in her province by 2030 in a major push to curb greenhouse gas emissions.  STORY HERE.

theguardian The Conservative prime minister pledged to make the country an ‘energy superpower’, but with the election ahead and many Alberta residents struggling to make ends meet, a promise has become a liability for Harper. Story here.

WC Native News PORT SIMPSON, B.C. – The first of three votes on a natural gas benefit offer worth over $1 billion has been unanimously rejected by a First Nation on British Columbia’s northwest coast. Story here.

Winnipeg Free Press Utility set to ratchet up domestic conservation. Details here. PLT photo

The Tyee One of Canada's top constitutional lawyers is taking the Conservative government to court over increasing restrictions on who can speak at energy board hearings -- and what they are allowed to say. Details here.

Winnipeg Free Press. The government has issued an Environment Act for Manitoba Hydro’s Bipole III transmission line. Full story here. Government of Manitoba. " Unprecedented Licence Conditions Exceed Clean Environment Commission Report,  Address Aboriginal Concerns: Mackintosh"   Details here.

Financial Post. CALGARY — The Canadian government on Friday blocked a seven-year-old plan to drill more than a thousand natural gas wells in an Alberta wildlife reserve... Details here.   PLT. Please also read our earlier post, "So, What Will it Be, Prairie Grasslands or Pipelines?" And thanks to Nature Canada for organizing the petition. (I signed! Did you?) Sprague's pi pi t, one of the many  "species at risk" found in the reserve.

Winnipeg Free Press. Details here. PLT: You don't suppose BP will simply write this off as "the cost of doing business" and carry on as before, do you? Naaaah!

Pro Publica Nov 10 - A federal energy panel issued a blunt warning to shale gas drillers and their regulators today, saying they need to step up efforts to protect public health and the environment or risk a backlash that stifles further development. Details here.

Manitoba Co-Operator - Oct 11 Land-use changes make emissions reductions uncertain:   report. Details here. Wheat on ground; PLT photo Please also read "Bursting the Ethanol Bubble."

Shawn Mccarthy — Globe and Mail - Aug. 07   Maxim Power Corp. is racing to beat proposed federal emission regulations that could derail its plan to build a 500-megawatt coal-fired power plant in the mountains of western Alberta. Details here. PLT: Please sign the petition here. 

Nick Young - Greenpeace - 6/6/11 Today an Amsterdam court judge turned the tables on Cairn Energy. Details here. Greenpeace protesters spent four days in a survival pod attached to the the Leiv Eiriksson rig.  (Photograph: Steve Morgan/Greenpeace) 

AlterNet / By Jill Richardson Feb '11 Given America's enthusiasm for ethanol production, on e might assume ethanol is a miracle fuel, sent from heaven to lead the way to independence from oil. Please also read: "Bursting the Ethanol Bubble" by Larry Powell

By Andrew Nikiforuk, 12 Jan 2011, TheTyee.ca Farmers say high profile carbon sequestration experiment is a bubbling, dangerous failure.

P.J. Partington — The Pembina Institute - Dec. 2'10 It would be hard to count…..  Reuters photo

David Smith - guardian.co.uk - 8 De 2010 US embassy cables reveal top executive's claims that company 'knows everything' about key decisions in government ministries .

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