Oil Sands Produces Its Own Heat Island Effect - Dramatic changes to landscape raise temps, UA study finds

Canada's oil sands project has created an "urban heat island" effect, drying out a city-sized area and raising the local temperature by more than a degree.

In a study released last month, University of Alberta researchers found that existing mining activities (which occupy more than 600 sq. km or an area slightly smaller than Edmonton) have dramatically raised temperatures but have not yet changed rain patterns or thunderstorms.

The study, published in the journal Earth Interactions, found that summer overnight minimum temperatures near the oil sands have increased by about 1.2 C compared to the regional average due to waste heat released by the world's largest energy project.

"It's a big disturbed area. There is a definite heat island effect as there would be in any city of that size," notes Daniel Brown, the study's lead author and a University of Alberta PhD student studying thunderstorms.

The area has also become drier than the surrounding region probably due to the removal of millions of spruce and aspen trees.

ENERGY & EQUITY: Why should Canada now beg to fuel China's colossal waste of energy?

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, a neo-classical economist, visited Imperial China this week to do some energy begging on behalf of investors in the world's third largest oil reserves.

Harper, accompanied by his pals at Enbridge and EnCana, shamelessly shuffled down the same petroleum road padded by the world's well-known ethical oil crowd: Iran, Saudi Arabia and Hugo Chavez.

The jaunty Venezuelan, who sits on the world's second largest oil reserve, visited the Communist superpower five times in recent years to ink eight agreements on energy cooperation no less. Chavez, as you might guess, has some ethical issues with the United States.

Now Harper, a self-confessed libertarian and a champion prison builder, also has some ethical problems with the United States. That frightful democracy ignored Harper's Big Oil lobby and then temporarily rejected a "no-brainer" pipeline.

The ill-fated Keystone XL pipeline promised to deliver landlocked bitumen to refineries owned by Saudi Armaco, Venezuela and the Koch brothers in the Gulf of Mexico.

Sheldon Adelson and the End of American Anti-Semitism

If a Jew-hater somewhere, inspired perhaps by The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, sought to invent an individual who symbolizes almost all the anti-Semitic clichés that have dogged the Jewish people throughout history, he could hardly come up with a character more perfect than Sheldon Adelson.


Think about it. Adelson, who likes to brag, “You know, I am the richest Jew in the world,” is a gambling magnate who is reported to be under criminal investigation for official bribery and has been accused of having widespread ties to organized crime, including the use of prostitution for his business interests. He is openly deploying his $22 billion fortune to pervert our democracy on behalf of what he believes to be the best interests of Israel, which he defines as an endless war by the Jewish state against its adversaries, with America offering its unquestioning support.

When it comes to Israel, Adelson is as hawkish as they come. He told the Jewish Week, “The two-state solution is a stepping stone for the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people.” He withdrew his financial support to then–Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert when the latter became serious about peace negotiations. He even found AIPAC a bit wishy-washy for his taste and cut it off, as well. Significantly, he remains a big supporter of Bibi Netanyahu, and has gone so far as to fund a free Fox News–style Israeli newspaper devoted to cheerleading for his right-wing policies and attacking all who disagree.

Some States Using Mortgage Deal Funds To Close Budget Gaps

Well, that was fast.

Two states have already announced that they won't be using all of their share of the $25 billion allocated in Thursday's historic foreclosure settlement to pay its intended recipients -- the homeowners and borrowers who saw the housing market collapse beneath their feet.

Instead, in some areas, a share of those dollars is likely to be diverted to state budgets, in a bid to offset some of the massive deficits that states have been struggling with since the economic downturn, according to reports.

In Wisconsin, Governor Scott Walker and state Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen have announced plans to use $25.6 million of the settlement money -- about 18 percent of the $140 million Wisconsin will get in total -- to plug holes in the state's budget, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. As the MJS notes, this is a reversal of Walker's previous opposition to using legal settlements to close budget gaps.

Meanwhile, in Missouri, state Attorney General Chris Koster has said that he plans to put $40 million of Missouri's settlement money -- about 20 percent of the total $196 million -- into the general state fund, apparently in response to Governor Jay Nixon's call for a stronger college and university budget, Stateline reported.

Pro-oil lobby retreat urges feds to deliver climate-change solutions

OTTAWA — A taxpayer-funded pro-oil lobbying retreat, involving Canada’s European diplomats and industry, has urged the federal government to deliver real climate change solutions to restore the country’s sagging environmental reputation.

The two-day retreat, held last February 1 and 2 in London, England, concluded that Canada’s foreign diplomats don’t have enough resources to deliver on the federal government’s aggressive lobbying strategy to promote the oilsands and fight foreign climate change policies. But participants at the meeting, including bureaucrats who travelled from Canada, suggested lobbying is not the only answer.

“There was a sense that the sooner the Canadian government is able to roll out information on anticipated new regulations on coal fired generation and the oil sands, the better able Canada will be to demonstrate that it is taking action,” wrote Sushma Gera, a trade adviser at the Canadian High Commission in London, in a widely-distributed e-mail that was released to Postmedia News through access to information legislation.

Gera’s email summarized the February 2011 retreat which brought together Canadian diplomats from 13 different European offices, along with officials from other federal departments in Ottawa, industry representatives, and Ron Liepert who was Alberta’s energy minister at that time.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade was not able to immediately provide the cost of the event that included a “training” session to give diplomats on the European lobbying team “an industry perspective” as well as that of the federal and Alberta governments. Another email from Gera sent in January 2011 said that separate budgets within DFAIT for European relations and “Strategy and Services” were used to pay some travel funding.

Budget watchdog stands by pension plan analysis

Biting back at critics, Canada's budget watchdog maintains it's disingenuous to insist that an impending wave of retiring baby boomers is going to trigger a fiscal emergency.

"The old age demographic is not a new issue. We've known this was coming for decades," Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page told CTV's Question Period Sunday.

Page has had his back against the proverbial ropes ever since his office released a sustainability report last week indicating the government can afford to enhance benefits for seniors.

The findings are at odds with Prime Minister Stephen Harper's aims to reform Canada's Old Age Security Program, suggesting the current model is unsustainable.

Though Page is tasked with providing independent analysis, his office's recent report has riled government ministers. Particularly outraged is Finance Minister Jim Flaherty who called Page "unbelievable, unreliable, incredible" in a scrum last week.

Vets board member says privacy raided after he sides too often with veterans

OTTAWA - A prominent, long-standing member of the country's Veterans Review and Appeal Board had his privacy violated twice in an alleged smear campaign meant to discredit him using his private medical information as ammunition, The Canadian Press has learned.

The behind-the-scenes fight involving Harold Leduc has been so bad and so vicious that the Canadian Human Rights Commission quietly ordered the veterans board to pay the decorated, former warrant officer $4,000, including legal costs, for harassment he'd suffered from other agency members.

Leduc, who spent 22 years in the military, claims he was a target for gossip, innuendo and intimidation because he often sided with veterans in his review decisions.

It is the latest, and potentially the most wide-ranging, in a series of privacy breaches, which the Conservative government claimed was cleaned up at the department that oversees the care of ex-soldiers and RCMP.

In late 2010 following the privacy scandal involving advocate Sean Bruyea, the government said it instituted tighter controls over the personal information of veterans and who had access to files.

Yet, in the spring of 2011, an investigation report, which included Leduc's personal information and examined the toxic in-fighting at the independent agency, was released un-censored following an access to information request.

Athens burns as Greece bailout passed

Riots engulfed central Athens and at least 10 buildings went up in flames in mass protests late Sunday as parlimentary lawmakers voted to enact unpopular austerity measures aimed at keeping the country solvent.

TV footage showed a three-storey corner building completely consumed by flames with riot officers looking on from the street, and firefighters trying to douse the blaze. A closed cinema, a bank, a mobile phone dealership, a glassware store and a cafeteria were among the burning buildings, the fire department said.

There were no reports of people trapped inside.

Protesters had set bonfires in front of parliament and dozens of riot police formed lines in an effort to deter them from attempting a run on the building.

Before the vote result was announced early Monday, Prime Minister Lucas Papademos had urged calm, pointing to the country's dire financial straits.

Greek parliament approves crucial austerity bill after riots rage in Athens

ATHENS —Greek lawmakers on Monday approved harsh new austerity measures demanded by bailout creditors to save the debt-crippled nation from bankruptcy, after rioters in central Athens torched buildings, looted shops and clashed with riot police.

The historic vote paves the way for Greece's European partners and the International Monetary Fund to release $170 billion (€130 billion) in new rescue loans, without which Greece would default on its debt mountain next month and likely leave the eurozone — a scenario that would further roil global markets.

Lawmakers voted 199-74 in favour of the cutbacks, despite strong dissent among the two main coalition members. A total 37 lawmakers from the majority Socialists and conservative New Democracy party either voted against the party line, abstained or voted present.

Sunday's clashes erupted after more than 100,000 protesters marched to the parliament to rally against the drastic cuts, which will axe one in five civil service jobs and slash the minimum wage by more than a fifth.

Contraception Row Could Rebound in Obama’s Favor

Having failed to take adequate precautions, President Obama and Kathleen Sebelius, his secretary of Health and Human Services, were looking a bit sheepish on Friday lunchtime when they walked into the White House media-briefing room and administered a morning-after pill to quiet the controversy over a government edict requiring all employers, including ones with religious affiliations (though not churches and the like), to provide women with free birth control as part of their health-care plans.“No religious employers will have to pay for or provide contraceptive services, but people who work there will have access to free contraception,” the President said in outlining a compromise that he said “works for everyone.”

Under his new plan, in the case of religious institutions the onus on providing birth control will be shifted from employers to health insurers, who would be prohibited from charging co-payments or otherwise restricting the supply. This “shouldn’t be a wedge issue,” the President went on. “I certainly never saw it that way.” That is clear. If the White House’s political antennae had been sharper, it could have got together with the Department of Health and Human Services a month ago, before the announcement of the new rule. Quite possibly, this silly row might never have erupted. Still, I doubt the President will suffer much lasting political damage from it. Indeed, it could well rebound in his favor. Women are a much bigger voting group than Catholics. And even among ordinary Catholics, as opposed to the gilded church hierarchy, contraception just isn’t a very big deal.

To be sure, the Administration goofed in its handling of this issue. If it had tabled what looks like an eminently reasonable way to balance women’s rights with religious freedom, it would have passed the issue back to Roman Catholic bishops, a group whose moral and political authority has never been weaker, forcing them to oppose it. In issuing the new rules without adequate prep work, the Administration presented the bishops, led by New York Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan, with an opportunity to pose as the victims of an all-encroaching government. Then, as dawn follows night, the Republicans piled on, creating alarm in the White House political shop.