· Protesters cleared of damaging power station · Rare defence may boost other environment groups

· Protesters cleared of damaging power station
· Rare defence may boost other environment groups

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  John Vidal, environment editor
  
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  The Guardian,
  
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  Thursday September 11 2008
  
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  Article history
  

The jury of nine men and three women at Maidstone crown court cleared the six by a majority verdict. Five of the protesters had scaled a 200-metre chimney at Kingsnorth power station, Hoo, Kent, in October last year.

The activists admitted trying to shut down the station by occupying the smokestack and painting the word "Gordon" down the chimney, but argued that they were legally justified because they were trying to prevent climate change causing greater damage to property around the world. It was the first case in which preventing property damage caused by climate change had been used as part of a "lawful excuse" defence in court. It is now expected to be used more widely by environment groups.

In his summing-up at the end of an eight-day trial, the judge, David Caddick, said the case centred on whether or not the protesters had a lawful excuse for their actions. He told the jury that for this defence to be used it had to be proved that the action was due to an immediate need to protect property belonging to another.

He said allowance for demonstrations did not extend to breaking the law and the jury's task was to examine the boundary line represented by the lawful excuse and to evaluate whether the defendants had crossed the line. He also warned the jury to put aside any feelings towards Greenpeace, climate change or fuel companies during their deliberations.

John Price, prosecuting, had earlier argued that the protesters' actions were "not capable of being lawful". He said: "There are things you can lawfully do in making a protest but there's a line which has to be drawn. When the defendants caused damage to that chimney, it's the line that they crossed."

The court had heard from Professor Jim Hansen, one of the world's leading climate scientists, that the 20,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emitted daily by Kingsnorth could be responsible for the extinction of up to 400 species. Hansen, a Nasa director who advises Al Gore, the former US presidential candidate turned climate change campaigner, told the court that humanity was in "grave peril". "Somebody needs to step forward and say there has to be a moratorium, draw a line in the sand and say no more coal-fired power stations."

It also heard David Cameron's environment adviser, millionaire environmentalist Zac Goldsmith, and an Inuit leader from Greenland both say climate change was already seriously affecting life around the world. Goldsmith told the court: "By building a coal-power plant in this country, it makes it very much harder [to exert] pressure on countries like China and India" to reduce their burgeoning use of the fossil fuel.

The court was told that some of the property in immediate need of protection included parts of Kent at risk from rising sea levels, the Pacific island state of Tuvalu and areas of Greenland. The defendants also cited the Arctic ice sheet, China's Yellow River region, the Larsen B ice shelf in Antarctica, coastal areas of Bangladesh and the city of New Orleans.

The jury was told that Kingsnorth emitted the same amount of carbon dioxide as the 30 least polluting countries in the world combined - and that there were advanced plans to build a new coal-fired power station next to the existing site on the Hoo peninsula.

Greenpeace used the court's decision to put pressure on the government to abandon plans for a new generation of coal-fired plants. "Today's acquittal is a potent challenge to the government's plans for new coal-fired stations from jurors representing ordinary people in Britain who, after hearing the evidence, supported the right to take direct action in order to protect the climate," said Ben Stewart, the group's communications director and one of the six acquitted. The others were Will Rose, Kevin Drake, Tim Hewke, Huw Williams and Emily Hall.

"It wasn't only us in the dock, it was coal-fired power generation as well," said Hall. "The only people left in Britain who think new coal is a good idea are business secretary John Hutton and the energy minister Malcolm Wicks. It's time the prime minister stepped in and embraced a clean energy future for Britain."

Winning causes

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva spoke with Cuban President Raul Castro by phone for nearly an hour, a source in the presidential palace said, and convened seven ministerial heads to discuss how best to help.

Cuban state media has shown widespread destruction across the island.

Marco Aurelio Garcia, a presidential spokesman, offered similar assistance in a telephone conversation with Haitian President Rene Preval on Tuesday. Recent storms have killed hundreds of people in Haiti, where Brazilian troops make up a large part of the U.N. peace keeping force.

The Brazilian government is setting up a task force to organize the shipments of food, construction material and equipment for repairing electricity in the two countries.

Source: http://www.caribbeannetnews.com/news-10548--5-5--.html

2- Cuba - Deadly Ike cuts across Cuba as Haiti toll rises

09 – 10 – 08

HAVANA, Cuba: Deadly Hurricane Ike on Tuesday made its second pass in a week over Cuba, lashing the country's northwest and its crumbling capital Havana, tearing off roofs, uprooting trees, and leaving four dead.

The storm crashed into Pinar del Rio province from the south barely 60 miles west of the capital, sparking new flooding in a region blasted two weeks ago by Hurricane Gustav.

Authorities it had been "very difficult" to broadcast messages to prepare for Ike, because 33 percent of the province still lacked electricity.

"Nature gave us another blow. We hadn't even got up from Gustav. Two storms in such a short space of time is terrible," an inhabitant of Pinar del Rio told AFP by telephone.

Gustav charged into the Caribbean island's westernmost province on August 30 and destroyed or severely damaged 140,000 homes and buildings before heading to the US Gulf of Mexico coastline.

"In all of Cuba's history, we have never had two hurricanes this close together," Jose Rubiera, the head of Cuba's weather service, said on state television.

Although Ike was much weaker than Gustav -- category one compared with category four on the five-notch Saffir-Simpson scale -- it compounded Pinar del Rio's devastation, where some 100,000 homes were already destroyed and 600 schools damaged.

In the capital, authorities evacuated more than 20,000 people from colonial-era Old Havana, an elegant but fragile UNESCO World Heritage Site where centuries-old buildings are prone to cave-ins.

Electricity posts, trees and traffic lights lay battered on the ground and only police patroled the streets.

Residents barricaded their homes, lacking electricity and running water as they waited for the storm to pass.

"Everything is boarded up. It feels as if everything is flying around outside," a 49-year-old housewife told AFP from her home in the Vedado district.

Meanwhile, giant waves beat against the walls of the famous Malecon seaside walkway.

At 5:00 pm Ike's center was located offshore just north of Cuba 90 miles west-southwest of Havana with sustained winds of 75 miles kilometers an hour, according to the Miami-based US National Hurricane Center.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) launched a 5.8 million dollar appeal to help Cuba tackle a "very destructive" wave of hurricanes.

Ike drove some two million Cubans from their homes as it sliced across the lower half of the island Sunday, leaving three men and a woman dead.

It left a higher toll in Haiti, where it dumped heavy rains on northern towns and cities already inundated and struck by huge mudslides from three previous storms.

One hundred and one dead bodies have been found since Monday in Gonaives , the Haitian city hardest hit by Tropical Storm Hanna and Hurricane Ike, Vicky Delore-Ndjeuga, a spokesman for the UN Mission in Haiti, told AFP.

"As the floodwaters recede, we found three more bodies in the city," he said. "The total is now 101 dead," he said.

"If we don't find a way to deliver massive humanitarian aid, we will see fights and riots that will kill more people than the cyclone did," he warned.

Source: http://www.caribbeannetnews.com/news-10544--5-5--.html

3- Cuba - Ike Moved off Cuba, Enters Gulf
09 – 10 – 08

Havana, Cuba. - Hurricane Ike on Tuesday emerged into the Gulf of Mexico after crossing over Western Cuba as a Category 1 storm.

Ike moved over water in the southeast Gulf of Mexico at 03:45pm local time, the Cuban weather service reported.

The hurricane was packing maximum sustained winds of 120 kilometers per hour at the time it moved off the western province of Pinar del Rio.

Ike lashed the Caribbean largest island from one end to the other after making landfall in eastern Cuba on Sunday night as a Category 3 hurricane in the Saffir-Simpson scale of 5.

The hurricane left a long trail of destruction across the island state, forced over 1 million people to seek safety with relatives or at government shelters and killed at least four people.

Source: http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID={CFAC7E1A-96CA-44E8-8D74-942B2171B490})&language=EN

4- Cuba - Over 1 Million Evacuated in Cuba

09 – 1 0 – 08

HAVANA, Cuba.- Over 1 million people sought safety with relatives and friends or at government shelters as Hurricane Ike is about to make landfall on Cuba for the second time in less than 48 hours.

Civil Defense authorities reported that 1,233,336 people evacuated from their homes.

Ike, a Category 1 storm, is expected to hit Cuba between the provinces of Havana and Pinar del Rio, where thousands of residents lost their houses last week after the passage of Gustav, another powerful hurricane.

According to Colonel Jose Betancourt, the Cuban population has closely followed Civil Defense directions aimed at preventing human losses, although he regretted that some people are showing a low-risk perception by relaxing safety measures that should be observe under a hurricane warning.

People should seek shelter from powerful winds and avoid walking through flooded areas, he recalled. Those evacuated are not allowed to return to their homes until a special commission assesses the house safety.

The Civil Defense reported Monday night that four people died in Cuba as a result of Ike.

The hurricane made landfall in the north-eastern coast of Holguin on Sunday night as a Category 3 storm. It then weakened while running along Cuba´s southern coast.

Source: http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID={238F8D2D-462D-4F02-88C9-4C40A501E93D})&language=EN

5- Cuba - Hurricane Ike barrels over Cuba

09 – 10 – 08

Hurricane Ike rattled Havana after its second landfall in Cuba and is now swirling across the Gulf of Mexico on a projected path towards the Texas coast.

Ike destroyed at least 16 buildings in the Cuban capital but the city was spared the extensive damage suffered in other parts of the country.

The UN estimates the cost of the damage at between $3bn-$4bn.

Four people died in Cuba as a result of the hurricane - the first storm-related fatalities for several years.

One person was killed by a falling tree, an elderly woman died when her house collapsed and two others were electrocuted.

State television said almost 1.25 million people had been moved to shelters - more than one-tenth of the island's population.

Louisiana warning

The eye of the storm made its second landfall in Cuba's Pinar del Rio province, about 55 miles (90km) south-west of Havana, packing sustained winds of 80mph (130km/h).

Ike first struck in Holguin province, which is home to the nickel mines, the country's top export earner.

The BBC's Michael Voss in Havana says it is still too early to tell the full extent of the economic impact wrought by Ike.

Tens of thousands of buildings have been damaged and crops destroyed.

There is also likely to be an impact on the tourist industry, our correspondent says.

With the storm crossing the the Gulf of Mexico, it is expected to pick up speed and is projected to reach the US Gulf coast.

Louisiana's governor has warned coastal residents to be prepared to move inland.

The US National Hurricane Center projections show Ike reaching the Texas coast by the end of the week but the storm's path could veer.

Vulnerable architecture

The United Nations cultural agency, Unesco, has offered to help the Cuban government make good any damage to heritage sites and important buildings in Havana.

The agency's director in Havana, Herman van Hooff, said that the latest storm could be a setback to restoration work.

"Since the [1990s] there has been a very strong management system in place for the old Havana area, and a lot has been restored since then," he told the BBC.

"There is still a lot of fabric, a lot of architecture, a lot of housing that is in a fragile state, so any impact by a hurricane, be it wind or rain, is a great concern to everybody."

Cuba is still reeling from the effects of Hurricane Gustav, which hit just over a week ago, damaging almost 100,000 homes in the west of the island.

Ike earlier caused 66 deaths in Haiti and reportedly damaged 80% of the homes in the Turks and Caicos Islands.

Haiti, the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, has endured the onslaught of four tropical storms in a three-week period, causing more than 550 deaths.

President Bharrat Jagdeo underlined the importance of financing for sustainable forest management and emphasised the need to look beyond traditional approaches to financing for forests when he addressed ‘The Paramaribo Dialogue’ in Suriname.

Making reference to the work of the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Mc. Kinsey and Company, and the Stern Review who have all underlined the importance of addressing Deforestation as part of global climate change mitigation, President Jagdeo pointed out that forests need to be included in any international framework being established to address climate change. He noted that the current EU Carbon Trading Scheme does not recognise standing forests nor does the Kyoto Protocol, which actually provides a disincentive for tropical forest conservation and protection.

President Jagdeo, along with a team of high-level Government officials, attended the forum which was opened by President Runaldo Venetiaan of the Republic of Suriname.

The forum, which runs from September 8-12, is a Country-Led Initiative on Financing for Sustainable Forest Management in support of the United Nations Forum on Forests, and is organised by the Governments of the Republic of Suriname, among others.

President Jagdeo made the point that while Overseas Development Assistance for forest management has been helpful, there is need for a more predictable flow of finances which can only come from a market-based approach. He urged that much work needs to be done over the next year to influence decisions at the UNFCCC Conference of Parties (CoP) 14th Meeting in Poznan, Poland, in December 2008, and other key climate negotiations so that by CoP 15 in Copenhagen Denmark, 2009, there can be a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol that includes forests and one which takes into account Aforestation, Reforestation, and Avoided Deforestation, and allows for a market-based mechanism that provided adequate compensation for sustainable forest management and conservation.

The President of Guyana also emphasised that without proper valuation of our forests, tropical forest countries may be shortchanged in the negotiations. He referred to the complexity of trying to establish values for ecosystem services while emphasising the need to look at the issue of opportunity costs, since the majority of forest countries are poor countries that need to make economically viable decisions on their forests resources.

In making reference to the circumstances of Guyana and Suriname, as countries with high forest cover and very low deforestation rates, President Jagdeo posited that the current approach to establish a framework for Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) will not help countries like Suriname and Guyana, stating that emphasis needs to be placed on Avoided Deforestation.

Accompanying the President at the meeting were Minister of Tourism, Industry & Commerce Manniram Prashad; Advisers to the President, Shyam Nokta and Odinga Lumumba; Head of the Georgetown Chambers of Commerce, Gerry Gouveia, and Commissioner of Forests James Singh.

Source: http://www.guyanachronicle.com/topstory.html

7- Haiti - Haiti 'needs urgent storm help'

09 – 10 – 08

Haiti's new Prime Minister, Michele Pierre-Louis, says people displaced and stranded by recent storms are in urgent need of food and water.

She said Haiti had suffered ecological and economic disaster in the wake of four successive storms that left more than 550 people dead.

Strong winds and torrential rains over the past month have battered Haiti's already fragile infrastructure.

The UN and other agencies now say they face a huge task in distributing aid.

Ms Pierre-Louis told the BBC's Caribbean Service that the priority was to get supplies to people cut off by widespread flooding.

She said that since early on Tuesday morning - when weather conditions had improved - helicopters had been flying supplies from a US aid ship to people stranded throughout the country.

"This is the most urgent part. Then we are making an assessment of the destruction, in terms of education, health and agriculture, so that we can launch an urgent plea to the international community for help," Ms Pierre-Louis said.

The prime minister only took office on 5 September after a tortuous confirmation process, with her government replacing the one dismissed in April for failing to manage the economy of the desperately poor country.

That came against a background of riots over high food and fuel prices, during which at least six people were killed.

Ms Pierre-Louis said her government would try its best to deal with the situation but admitted that Haiti, beset by years of political instability, had very weak institutions.

She said she was reaching out to the country's parliament, political class and the private sector.

"I think it is time to put behind us all our frustrations and differences, and if we're not able to do that, believe me, I don't think we're going to get out of this."

The last hurricane to affect Haiti, Ike, compounded the devastation wrought by Tropical Storm Fay, Hurricane Gustav and Tropical Storm Hanna.

The northern city of Gonaives has been particularly badly hit by flooding. So far 101 bodies have been found there as the floodwaters recede.

Vicky Delore-Ndjeuga, a spokesman for the UN Mission in Haiti, said that number could increase as people become increasingly desperate for aid.

"If we don't find a way to deliver massive humanitarian aid, [we] will see fights and riots that will kill more people than the cyclone did," she told the AFP news agency.

Elsewhere in the region, in the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southern Bahamas, people are also facing huge repairs after Ike roared through the region as a powerful category four hurricane.

In the Turks and Caicos, nearly 80% of buildings are reported to have been damaged.

Nine of the deaths were attributed to Fay, 79 to Gustav, 183 to Hanna and 70 to Ike, said Abel Nazaire, deputy head of Haiti's Civil Protection Service.

The country's fragile infrastructure was overloaded after the storms and officials were concerned that the floodwaters could spread disease, Sophie Boutaud de la Combe, a spokeswoman for the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, said Tuesday.

Gonaives, on the west coast, is one of the hardest-hit cities.

This week, Gonaives was knee-deep in filthy water and reachable only by water or air, with many of Haiti's bridges destroyed and roads flooded.

"My home is destroyed. I have no place to live with my kids. Everything I had just washed away," Roselene Josef told CNN.

Another survivor said, "The flood washed away everything. I couldn't save anything. They should just move this city. Floods always destroy it."

Aid workers warned of a deepening humanitarian crisis as attempts to deliver aid were frustrated by logistical problems.

The U.S. Navy's USS Kearsarge arrived in the waters off Haiti on Monday to support the U.S. Agency for International Development's efforts to assist after the devastation.

The vessel will help move cargo and equipment between affected cities and will deliver relief supplies, said the U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command.

But Monday, the Kearsarge wasn't able to deliver anything to Gonaives, because the ship's scout helicopters couldn't find a suitable place for supplies to be unloaded, according to The Associated Press.

A U.S. Coast Guard ship carrying 35 tons of relief supplies arrived Saturday in Gonaives.

The U.S. cutter was preceded by a ship carrying U.N. relief supplies, including 19 tons of high-energy biscuits, 50,000 bottles of water and water purification tablets, which arrived Friday in Gonaives, said Myrta Kaulard of the United Nations' World Food Program.

CNN's Karl Penhaul watched as U.N. troops handed out scant supplies of food and water to a long line of Haitians. The line became chaotic, with people fighting over supplies.

Hundreds of people had taken shelter in a school. They told Penhaul they had not received relief aid in a week.

An official in Gonaives told the AP on Monday that nine people had died in shelters, including two children. It was not clear if they had died of starvation or some other cause, Daniel Dupiton of the region's civil protection department told the AP.

When floodwaters were at their highest, some residents camped out on their roofs, their clothing and blankets hung over the sides of buildings.

Some people "have lost really everything. ... These are not rich people, these are people who were really struggling [already] against high food prices," Kaulard said.

U.S. Navy Capt. Frank Ponds said he had flown over part of southern and northern Haiti. "I saw towns that were completely flooded," Ponds said. "I saw infrastructure, such as bridge[s] and roads, totally wiped out."

The eye of Hurricane Ike never touched Haiti earlier this week, but the storm system did bring heavy rains and winds to Gonaives and other towns.

Jean Pierre Guiteau, executive director for the Red Cross in Haiti, said 52 people were killed when a river burst its banks in the mountain town of Cabaret near the capital, Port-au-Prince.

Another 21 bodies were pulled from sea at Fort-Liberté, Haiti, close to the border with the Dominican Republic.

"It's a very grim picture," Guiteau said Sunday. "Things certainly are getting no better."

Source: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/09/09/haiti.gonaives.flood/index.html

9- Jamaica - Chinese Red Cross donates US$50,000 to assist storm victims in Jamaica

09 – 10 – 08

KINGSTON, Jamaica: The Jamaica Red Cross has received a cheque, valued at US$50,000, from the Chinese Red Cross, to assist with the recovery process, following the passage of Tropical Storm Gustav.

At the handing over ceremony in Kingston on September 5, Chinese Charge d'Affaires, Kan Liu, expressed deepest sympathy and condolence to the many who were affected and to the families that lost loved ones during the storm.

"The donation from the Chinese Red Cross, reflects the deep solicitude and profound feelings from the Chinese people to the Jamaican people," he said.

He pointed out that China is prone to natural disasters and as such, could truly identify with what has occurred in the island.

"China is a country which is subject to natural disasters every year. As you know, in last May, China suffered from a severe earthquake in the Southwest of the country, which caused the casualty of nearly 90,000. The Chinese people understand fully how difficult life can be and how much painstaking effort is needed on the road towards recovery right, after a major natural disaster," he said.

Liu assured that his country would continue to do whatever it could, to assist the island in the reconstruction effort, adding that they would remain a reliable development partner.

"It is my firm conviction that the Jamaican people will soon recover from the disaster and make their homeland even more beautiful," he said.

Liu also disclosed that the Chinese Government has made a decision to offer a grant assistance of US$100,000, to the Government for the disaster relief.

Director General of the Jamaica Red Cross, Yvonne Clarke, in her remarks, said that many persons would benefit from the contribution, adding that persons in shelters and who were severely affected by the passage of the storm, would be "the number one priority."

"We are concerned about the farmers who have lost their crops and will not be able to support their families for quite a long time. We are concerned about persons like those. We are concerned about the single headed households who cannot go off to work now because they have nowhere to leave their children. So, there are many persons who will benefit from this contribution," she said.

Clarke said that psychological support and counselling were essential during this period, especially for those who were affected by the storm and those who were assisting them.

"I am very happy and honoured for the contribution of the Chinese Red Cross and the Chinese Government. We have had a very long and wonderful relationship," she said.

Heated legal battles persist between Anam and mining giant Petaquilla as construction of the company’s gold mine nears completion.

Gold fever is the impetus behind the ongoing devastation of one of Panama’s largest forest reserves.New aerial photographs taken by La Prensa reveal the ravages suffered by the forest zones in Cerro Petaquilla and Río Molejón by a mining project that continues despite never having completed an environmental impact assessment and repeated warnings by environmental and civil society groups. Mining juggernaut Petaquilla Gold has carved the mine out of a 13,000-hectare swathe of protected forest territory in the Donoso district of the Colón province.

Efforts by the Autoridad Nacional del Ambiente (Anam) to halt the project’s rapacious progress have been thwarted time and again. After its latest attempt, the agency was barred from taking further action after the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the mining company.

Then, just as Petaquilla representatives were celebrating the beginning of work on the gold mine, another ruling appeared to give Anam the upper hand. On 29 July, the Supreme Court overturned the company’s appeal in favor of Anam, on the grounds that the government maintains the right to force Petaquilla to adhere to the new environmental regulations.

Now, Petaquilla Gold has requested a “clarification of judgement,” a twist that will keep Anam’s hands tied in pursuing legal restraints against the project while the company finishes building the infrastructure for the mine. Anam director Ligia Castro, told La Prensa that although her office can’t take actions against Petaquilla Gold, the legal processes that were initiated before the company’s appeal are now quite advanced.

“We have to wait for the Court to make its judgment before we can finish the reports,” she explained. “For now, we can’t stop the mine’s construction.” Reports submitted by Petaquilla Gold predict that the mine, already nearing completion, will generate between 317,696 to 593,000 ounces of gold, which equates to between $248.3 million and $463.5 million dollars according to the precious metal’s current price in international markets.

Anam also has a lawsuit pending against the branch of the company, Petaquilla Copper, which intends to create a copper mine on the same concession in Colón.

The birds died after landing in the spill, which was found Monday at an out-of-service conventional oil well in the southwest corner of CFB Suffield, in southeastern Alberta. The well is operated by Calgary-based Harvest Energy Trust.

The new deaths have occurred at a bad time for Canadian oil companies, whose public image was hit earlier this year when 500 ducks and other waterfowl strayed into a waste pond at the Syncrude Canada Ltd. oil sands facility. Pictures of those oil-covered birds made international headlines, as environmental groups used the incident to illustrate the perceived hazards resulting from oil sands development.

The Harvest leak is from a conventional oil field, and not related to the oil sands. However, it's still the latest “environmental catastrophe” to hit the province, said Greenpeace Canada spokesman Mike Hudema.

“It really points to the fact that the environment in Alberta is not under good hands or good management right now. Things are really spinning wildly out of control,” he said.

Both the province and Ottawa could be doing more to protect wildlife and the environment in the face of relentless development of oil and gas resources, he added.

“There's definitely a huge problem in terms of provincial and federal management when it comes to the environmental situation here,” Mr. Hudema said.

David Pryce, vice-president for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said that the incident was “unfortunate” and that the industry would examine it the incident closely.

“What the industry needs to do, and will do, is take steps to learn from this,” he said. “We need to make sure we are doing an appropriate job.”

The leak was discovered by a surveying crew operating in the region, but it's not yet clear why it occurred or for how long oil seeped from the well, said Davis Sheremata, spokesman for the Alberta Energy Resources Conservation Board, the provincial regulator.

Up to 90 barrels of oil were leaked from the well, which was drilled by Harvest Energy on Dec. 5, 2005, but plugged and abandoned only days later on the 14th. Harvest Energy chief executive John Zahary said the trust has begun cleanup work at the well, the majority most of which is expected to be completed by today.

While Alberta has no inspection program for wells that have been abandoned, such wells must be plugged and covered with seven metres of concrete, and regulations had been followed by Harvest, Mr. Sheremata said.

“It is very rare for this to happen,” he said. “The majority of leaks happen at wells that are being drilled or are just going into production. This is highly unusual.”

Environment Canada spokeswoman Paula Franchellini said investigators were assessing the spill, but details are still scant. Ottawa says no waterways have been polluted.

“We are assessing the situation in a broad context and we have enforcement officials on site to determine whether any charges will be warranted,” Ms. Franchellini said.

Last April, 500 ducks and other waterfowl died in northern Alberta after landing in a toxic tailings pond operated by Syncrude. The company said a spring snowstorm that hit the oil sands region prevented the company from erecting noisemakers around the pond to scare away migratory birds.

But the incident proved to be a public-relations nightmare for the company, which was targeted by environmentalists who said the bird deaths were an example of the negative impact of so-called “dirty oil.”

Syncrude took out full-page newspaper ads to apologize, but both the federal and provincial governments started probes. The Alberta government opened an investigation under the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act, which carries a maximum fine of $1-million. A spokeswoman with Alberta Environment said she expects the province will make an announcement this month about whether there will be any charges in the case.

In July, Greenpeace activists broke into the Syncrude site to display banners at the tailings pond where the ducks died. In response, Syncrude initiated a $120,000 lawsuit against the environmental organization.

At the time of the duck deaths, Federal Environment Minister John Baird said he wasn't “happy” with the situation and wanted to “get to the bottom of it.”

“I want to hold those that are responsible to account and we want to make sure it doesn't happen again,” he said.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080909.wbirds0909/BNStory/National/?page=rss&id=RTGAM.20080909.wbirds0909


The Los Angeles Times
John McCain walks a fine line on the environment -
His choice of Sarah Palin as a running mate and new support for offshore oil drilling could undercut any standing on the issue he earned with his bipartisan proposal to limit greenhouse gas emissions

By Michael Finnegan

September 9, 2008 
The television ad shows John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, in scenic desert landscapes as he talks about the dangers of global warming. "We have an obligation to future generations to take action and fix it," he says.

Striving to appeal to moderate voters, McCain has frequently highlighted his bipartisan proposal to clamp down on greenhouse gas emissions.

But by naming Sarah Palin as his running mate, McCain has aligned himself with a Republican whose record as governor of Alaska has drawn scorn from environmentalists, most notably for her denial that humans are causing climate change.

That, combined with McCain's call for opening new stretches of coastline to oil drilling, risks undercutting his standing on the environment.

Global warming has been one of the main issues McCain has used to put distance between himself and his party's tarnished brand. In pursuit of that goal, he and Palin also have cast themselves in recent days as reformers who would shake up Washington.

In a time of war and economic troubles, the environment ranks low on the list of voter priorities. But it carries symbolic value and offers McCain a way to suggest that he would break with the unpopular Bush administration. Given the scant contrasts between McCain and President Bush on Iraq and the economy, anything that helps the Arizona senator distinguish himself could prove crucial.

"The environment is important to many of the groups of people that McCain has to make some progress with -- especially to many independents," said pollster Andrew Kohut, president of the nonpartisan Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.

Doug Holtz-Eakin, a senior McCain policy advisor, said that neither Palin's presence on the ticket nor McCain's shift on oil drilling would harm his standing as a champion of the environment. Environmentalists who criticize McCain "don't represent the entire spectrum" of opinion, he said, and others recognize that coal, nuclear power, gas and oil must be part of any "thoughtful approach" to global warming.

The major environmental groups, however, favor Illinois Sen. Barack Obama over McCain. The League of Conservation Voters gives the Democratic presidential nominee a lifetime score of 86% on environmental votes. McCain's score is 24%.

Nonetheless, environmentalists have cheered McCain for backing a cap on carbon emissions that contribute to global warming, a position not shared by many in his party. They have also applauded him for opposing oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a longtime goal of Bush and other Republicans, including Palin.

"To his credit, we've always said that John McCain was better on the environment than George Bush, but that's an incredibly low bar because Bush was the most anti-environment president we've ever seen," said Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation Voters.

The McCain campaign's focus on global warming follows a tradition of Republicans brandishing their environmental credentials to gain support among Democrats and independents. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger made California's law limiting greenhouse gas emissions a centerpiece of his reelection campaign two years ago.

Jim Douglas, the Republican governor of left-leaning Vermont, took on Bush in his 2004 reelection bid. "We backed legal action against the federal government when they wouldn't protect our air and water," Douglas told Vermont TV viewers in an ad.

But in June, McCain dropped his support for the federal ban on new offshore oil drilling. His sudden reversal, in a speech to cheering energy executives in Houston, set off a fierce backlash among environmentalists.

"We have a card-carrying member of the oil wing of the Republican Party," said Carl D. Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club. "There's nothing left of his independence."

McCain's decision to focus on drilling as a key to lower gasoline prices ("Drill, baby, drill," supporters chanted at the Republican convention last week in St. Paul, Minn.) has intensified the anger among environmentalists.

They have ridiculed McCain ads that tout coastal drilling in tandem with renewable power from wind turbines. In the Senate, they note, McCain has voted repeatedly against renewable energy bills. Pope, for one, called the ads "cynical and manipulative."

But the political imperative for McCain was to demonstrate that he would take action against gas prices that had soared above $4 per gallon. A Pew survey in June showed a rise in voter support for expanded energy exploration, including in the Alaska wildlife refuge.

Voters "don't want to hear about magic unicorn-powered cars or future, down-the-line, hydrogen-powered vehicles," said Rick Wilson, a Republican strategist behind the Vermont TV ad. "They want to know how you're going to cut the price of gas at the pump."

The shift in public opinion helps explain the new willingness even of Democrats, Obama among them, to consider lifting the offshore drilling ban.

Beyond coastal drilling, McCain faces new friction with environmentalists over Palin's record in Alaska. Among other things, she has backed aerial shooting of wolves and grizzly bears to keep them from eating the moose and caribou that many Alaskans -- including Palin -- hunt.

In a state where voters look favorably on oil and gas drilling, environmentalists say Palin has been better than previous Republican governors. She has promoted state subsidies for renewable energy and set up a panel of advisors to plan for the impact of global warming in Alaska. The state is already coping with the consequences of melting ice sheets, such as changes in animal migration patterns.

But in a national context, environmentalists see Palin's record as dismal. "Overall, I describe it as weak at best and ominous on climate change and energy policy," said Kate Troll, executive director of Alaska Conservation Voters.

Ignoring the recommendations of state scientists, Palin objected to the U.S. Interior Department's naming of the polar bear as a threatened species because melting ice has shrunk its habitat.

Palin has acknowledged that global warming is real but described herself last year as "not an Al Gore doom-and-gloom environmentalist blaming the changes in our climate on human activity," a viewpoint at odds with McCain's.

Holtz-Eakin, the McCain advisor, said that McCain, not Palin, would set the administration's direction on the environment. "She's a member of the ticket and supports his policies," he said.

As for drilling in the wildlife refuge, the two have agreed to disagree. "They've come down in different places on this," Holtz-Eakin said. "But he's the presidential nominee."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mccainenviro10-2008sep10,0,7198815.story?track=ntothtml


The Daily Green
In Haiti, a Disaster for the Global Warming Era -

Hurricane Ike, Still Battering Caribbean, Takes a Turn Toward Texas
September 9, 2008

Hurricane Ike continues to batter Cuba, as it makes its way across the island nation on its way to the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Now a Category 1 storm, it could strengthen before leaving Haiti, and is almost certain to regain major hurricane status in the Gulf of Mexico.

The real crisis is in Haiti, however, where hundreds have died after mudslides and flooding from a procession of strong storms — Tropical Storm Fay and Hurricanes Gustav, Hanna and Ike — and where food riots earlier this year had already demonstrated the impoverished nation's fragile infrastructure.

Aid groups are worried that they will be unable to feed the starving population, as rice supplies fall far short, with only about one-tenth as much food as is needed, according to Reuters.

Worldwide, food supplies have been short and expensive, due in part to weather disasters elsewhere and in part to the diversion of cropland to the growing of biofuel crops, such as corn for ethanol. In that, the Haitian situation can be seen as emblematic of the global warming era: Stronger storms are expected to cause more flooding, particularly in impoverished nations, and the world's ability to respond isn't growing in concert.

Experts have wrangled over the twin global warming goals of mitigation and adaptation — how much to focus on stopping global warming, and how much to focus on preparing for the inevitable changes to come. At this point, little in the United States — historically the largest emitter of greenhouse gases, and still the largest per capita polluter — is being done to reach either goal.

Haiti is particularly vulnerable because its forests have all but been clear-cut over hundreds of years of colonial rule and mismanaged and volatile independence. Deforestation increases the risk of flooding, since rainwater runs off rather than soaking in and being taken up by roots; mud sloughs off with it, increasing the danger.

Hurricane Ike is the fifth hurricane to form in the Atlantic basin in 2008, and it is the most powerful yet to make landfall. Before Ike, there had been four deadly storms in the Atlantic, Hurricanes Dolly, Gustav, Hanna and Tropical Storm Fay. Hanna, which is blamed for at least 163 deaths in Haiti, and possibly more than 500, is the deadliest storm so far.

Ike is expected to move into the Gulf of Mexico, where it will feed on warm waters and regain strength. The projected path of Hurricane Ike takes it to the south Texas Gulf Coast, but forecasters at the National Hurricane Center warn: "It cannot be overemphasized that one should not focus on four- and five-day forecast points, since these can be subject to substantial errors. Do not forget that a few days ago, the guidance unanimously had Ike near South Florida and then gradually shifted the danger toward Western Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico."

Behind Ike, Tropical Storm Josephine has dissipated. Meanwhile, in the eastern Pacific, Tropical Storm Lowell formed off the coast of Mexico Saturday, and forecasters said the 12th storm in the eastern Pacific will make landfall in Baja California late Wednesday or early Thursday.

The Atlantic tropical storm and hurricane season is only now at its traditional peak. Already there have been 10 named storms, including five hurricanes (Bertha, Dolly, Gustav, Hanna and Ike), three of them major (Bertha, Gustav and Ike).

The latest government forecast called for 14 to 18 named storms, seven to 10 of which would become hurricanes, three to six of them major.