Acclaimed Polar Bear Researcher Has "Integrity Issues"

Who'd have thunk it? The guy who wrote up the report of dead polar polar bears in the water that was cited extensively by Al Gore and used by enviro wackos everywhere to pressure the planet to panic over global warming seems to have some integrity issues.

A federal wildlife biologist whose observation in 2004 of presumably drowned polar bears in the Arctic helped to galvanize the global warming movement has been placed on administrative leave and is being investigated for scientific misconduct, possibly over the veracity of that article.

Charles Monnett, an Anchorage-based scientist with the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, or BOEMRE, was told July 18 that he was being put on leave, pending results of an investigation into "integrity issues."

There was another scientist that accompanied Monnett on the study which was conducted in 2004 named Gleason. While he doesn't dispute the 4 dead polar bears he does dispute the cause.

According to a transcript, investigator Eric May asked Gleason his thoughts on Gore referencing the dead polar bears. Gleason said none of the polar bear papers he has written or co-authored has said "anything really" about global warming.

"It's something along the lines of the changing environment in the Arctic," he said.

Gleason said others put their own spin on research or observations.

Yes folks, four dead polar bears is all it takes for environmental zealots to shut down all the energy production in this country. Well that and some little guppies and lizards.

Environmental Wacko From 'Peaceful Uprising' Gets Prison Time, Supporter Threatens Violence

If you do the crime, be prepared to do the time.

A sentencing hearing turned into a rally supporting an environmental activist who has become an antihero after disrupting a government auction of oil and gas leases near two national parks in Utah.

Protesters gathered around the courthouse and dozens were arrested Tuesday as Tim DeChristopher launched into a lengthy address urging others fight climate change by taking similar steps of civil disobedience.

But U.S. District Judge Dee Benson said there was no excuse for the 29-year-old former wilderness guide's blatant disrespect for the rule of law.

Benson sentenced DeChristopher to two years in prison on Tuesday, making him the first person to be prosecuted for failing to make good on bids at a lease auction of Utah public lands. He ran up bids on 13 parcels totaling more than 22,000 acres near Arches and Canyonlands national parks in 2008.

"My intent both at the time of the auction and now was to expose, embarrass and hold accountable the oil and gas industry, to the point that it cut into their $100 billion profits," DeChristopher told Benson.

How about protesting the government that does nothing to earn money yet profits more than any industry could ever imagine?

In one fell swoop he goes from "antihero" to martyr. Yes, really.

DeChristopher certainly is a martyr for those who want to focus attention on human-caused global warming, and he probably takes some comfort in that. He said he has no regrets. But this extreme sentence, more than a rallying point, is an indictment of the judicial system that zeroed in on one young man who was acting according to his conscience but looks the other way when others illegally make the opposite point.

Two years is extreme? Really?

It gets even more amusing.

Since his arrest, DeChristopher has become a hero to others worried about environmental damage from drilling and convinced that greenhouse gases released from burning fossil fuels are warming the Earth, causing extreme weather, drought, wildfires and ultimately starvation, homelessness and disease for millions around the globe.

He's convinced of things that just aren't happening.

Maybe a couple of years in the clink will make him comes to his sense. Yet judging by the company he keeps, that's an extreme long shot.

The case has become a symbol of solidarity for environmentalists, including celebrities like Robert Redford and Daryl Hannah. Peter Yarrow of the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary, led a sing-a-long and rally outside the courthouse in the hours leading up to the hearing.

The event was organized by DeChristopher's nonprofit group, Peaceful Uprising.

Carlos Martins, a college student at the protest rally, said after the sentencing that "they gave him that sentence to deter us, but they're proving that by making civil disobedience impossible, they're making violent actions inevitable."

OK, so if they don't get their way, just threaten violence. Thanks for the heads-up, Carlos. Now the authorities know your name.

Does Carlos see the irony that he's with a group called Peaceful Uprising while he's threatening violence?

Meanwhile, leave it to convicted child molester to rally to his side.

"Throughout American history, acts of civil disobedience have led to change. Think about the Underground Railroad that helped escaped slaves to freedom, or about the courageous actions of people like Rosa Parks, who refused to stay in the back of the bus simply because of their skin color. Without this kind of defiance of unjust laws, our country would likely still be denying people of colour basic freedoms."

Rosa Parks? Huh?

Only Takes 394 Years To Break Even On Hybrid Car

This ain't gonna sit well with the enviro weenies at the EPA. It isn't just this one model but pretty much all hybrids across the board. I also like the comparison made using the gallons per passenger metric versus the miles per gallon. Here in Atlanta, where we spend more time stuck in traffic then actually moving, we tend to rate cars on gallons per hour.

Will Hybrid Cars Save You Cash?: MyFoxATLANTA.com

Photo of the Day: Environmental Wackos With Their Heads in the Sand

For their next trick, maybe they'll try sticking their heads elsewhere. I have a place in mind. Anyway, as the luxurious, two-week vacation disguised as "climate talks" heats up, things are really beginning to get serious. And what better way to symbolize the silliness than a bunch of goofballs sticking their heads in the sand?

Sierra Club activists bearing the flags of more than 20 countries bury their heads in Cancun, Mexico's, sandy beach Friday to symbolize their view of how United Nations climate talks are progressing.

The second week of negotiations kicked off Monday, with participants from 193 countries seeking to reach a deal that failed to materialize at last year's Copenhagen summit.

"We cannot leave Cancun empty-handed," Connie Hedegaard, the European Union's top climate official, told the AP.

Just like how a year ago they couldn't leave Copenhagen empty-handed. Yet did.

These things are just too complicated. Just imagine if they had to get real jobs and couldn't spend two weeks at the beach during December.

Sick and Getting Sicker: Global Warmers Now 'Hanging' Children

These maniacs seemingly are trying to outdo the Islamists. So far we've seen them blowing children up, and now these global warming maniacs are depicting children being hanged? How sick is this?

Ironically enough it's from a leftist group called ACT Responsible. Sure. If they acted responsibly they'd get off their high horse, get real jobs and become useful members of society. Instead they get off on blowing up kids on film and putting nooses around their necks.

Just imagine if a leftist politician were portrayed the same way. There'd be worldwide condemnation and hand-wringing over civility. There would be calls for hate crimes prosecutions. Instead most media just ignore craziness like this and then tell us we don't get the "humor" of it all. Seriously, how can anyone look at this image and not be outraged?

Predictable: Stupid Bloggers and Climate Deniers Didn't Understand the Humor of Blowing Up Children

You see, blowing up children and others was simply a subtle, nuanced form of humor that the great unwashed just couldn't comprehend. If only we could appreciate the genius behind obliterating climate change skeptics then the idiots behind this wouldn't have had to yank their film so quickly and issue rote apologies.

Whatever you think about No Pressure, the Richard Curtis short film for the 10:10 climate campaign published last Thursday before its withdrawal by the campaign group less than 24 hours later, one thing is undeniable: it has generated a high pressure torrent of comment across guardian.co.uk, Twitter, the blogosphere and the press.

Indeed, mass homicide pretending to be humor can elicit immediate response. I guess they figured everyone would immediately appreciate blood-spattered classrooms littered with the body parts of children. Har-de-har-har.

First, a recap in case you missed it. The film, intended as a tongue-in-cheek spoof of hectoring greens, shows schoolkids, office workers, football manager David Ginola and actor Gillian Anderson being blown up for not signing up to cut their carbon emissions (hit Wikipedia for more detail). 10:10 has since apologised to anyone who was offended by the film - saying that it "missed the mark".

Plenty of people on our comment threads and Twitter thought the pantomime gore in the film was hilarious. And the film's shock value has certainly exposed 10:10 to a massive amount of global press coverage, including the Daily Mail, the BBC, the Independent, the Daily Express, The Australian. Even the Sun had some fun with it in their piece headlined "Gionola 'blown up' in internet ad". It has received over 170,000 views on YouTube and postings on countless other sites.

Some found it hilarious? These are the same people, of course, who can't even laugh when environmental wackos are made fun of. They'd prefer those who employ such humor to be brought up on hate crime charges, put in front of tribunals and, once can only assume from their mindset--executed for their "crimes" against humanity.

They just don't get it, and judging by the smarmy response from the warmers, they never will.

Jim Treacher has some thoughts, including a video remix. Tim Blair reminds us the big 10:10 day is coming. No doubt by then the warmies will all be portrayed as the protectors of the environment rather than those who revel in fantasy snuff films.

Lovely: Reduce Carbon Emissions By Blowing Up Children

No pressure at all. Just kill people who don't go along with environmental extremism.

Blowing up school children is just so hip, isn't it?

There has been a concerted campaign to paint everyone who does not agree with Al Gore and James Hansen as monstrous, ranging from allegories with the railroad trains filled with coal heading to some concentration camp to the late Stephen Schneider’s pathetic paper attempting to assert primacy and purity by miscounting academic publications.

But this is hate speech, pure and simple. It legitimizes almost any action against or characterization of those who do not agree with the most hysterical version of Catastrophic and Cataclysmic Climate Change–shoot ‘em all and let God sort ‘em out.

Using ten-year-old kids as both props and victims is a particularly nice touch.

When DDB created an ad for the WWF showing planes crashing into the World Trade Center as an advertisement asking for support for green activism, it was grotesque, tasteless and an insult to all who suffered losses on September 11th, 2001. It would have been impossible to imagine a cruder, less sensitive call to green action.

Until now.

For any of those on the activist side who wonder why skeptics (and lukewarmers) don’t trust the communications put forward by their team, they might wonder just how much any sign of reason might be contaminated by the stench from garbage like this.

It's a global movement. No pressure, of course.

Is it possible for these people to sink any lower?

They call it explosive comedy. Let them know how you feel.

Environmental Hypocrites Still Worshiping at the Altar of Obama

I suspect the environmental wackos would be singing a much different tune if George W. Bush were presiding over the country's biggest ecological catastrophe. Instead we've got a guy more concerned with golf and basketball who's doing nothing but whine getting a free pass.

As the greatest environmental catastrophe in U.S. history has played out on Obama’s watch, the environmental movement has essentially given him a pass — all but refusing to unleash any vocal criticism against the president even as the public has grown more frustrated by Obama’s performance.

About a dozen environmental groups took out a full page ad in the Washington Post Tuesday — not to fault Obama over the ecological catastrophe but to thank him for putting on hold an Alaska drilling project. “We deeply appreciate your decision. ...” the ad says to Obama.

“President Obama is the best environmental president we’ve had since Teddy Roosevelt,” Sierra Club chairman Carl Pope told the Bangor Daily News last week. “He obviously did not take the crisis in the Minerals Management Service adequately seriously, that’s clear. But his agencies have done a phenomenally good job.”

Really? Where's the evidence of that?

Some say there’s little doubt that if a spill like the one in the Gulf took place on former President George W. Bush’s watch, environmental groups would have unleashed an unsparing fury on the Republican in the White House. For their liberal ally, Obama, they seem willing to hold their tongues.

Their silence renders them null and void when it comes to anything that happens on a Republican's watch.

Great News! 'Green' Buildings Have 'Serious Problems With Respect to Environmental Quality and Human Health'

Let's look at the upside. You'll feel environmentally conscious and can boast to your friends and family that you care or something while dying a slow, mysterious death. Not only that, you'll go down knowing you lived in some "green" building that was the gold standard in certified green-ness. You sacrificed your life and dignity not for your country, but for a messianic movement, so stop complaining about the, um, potential health hazards.

The gold standard for certifying "green" buildings fails to place enough emphasis on human health and needs to be upgraded, according to a new report from an environmental health group.

The standard - Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED - is weighted more heavily toward energy conservation and not enough toward health protection, skewing green-design criteria, concluded Environmental and Human Health, Inc., a Connecticut-based nonprofit dedicated to protecting human health from environmental harms.

"They have to be given great credit for work on energy conservation. And there clearly are environmental quality and health benefits that will accrue from conservation efforts," said John Wargo, professor of risk analysis and environmental policy at Yale University and a lead author of the report, released in May.

"But (LEED) has got some serious problems with respect to environmental quality and human health."

But don't worry, folks, the gorwn-ups are in charge so just go back to sleep and vote Democrat in November.

The authors conclude that the task of certifying green design and defining "sustainability" for the nation's houses, offices and communities is simply too large for one nonprofit.

Uncle Sam must step in, said Nancy Alderman, the group's president.

"The Green Building Council is setting the green building standards with no oversight," she said. "That's problematic."

More fun here.

Don't forget some $60 billion of the (ahem) stimulus scam went to green jobs. Even a year ago it was deemed a failure, long before the departure of Van Jones.

NBC To Air Environmental Special With Extremist Nutcase

Surely you were expecting Al Gore, right? Well, NBC has found someone even more daft to highlight in some propaganda film coming this fall.

Britain's Prince Charles will be featured on NBC later this year in a film about his environmental work.

The network said Tuesday it will show "Harmony," a movie about the prince and his view that people have lost the understanding of how to live in harmony with the natural world. It features business and environmental leaders working for a better balance.

Paul Telegdy, head of alternative programming at NBC, said Prince Charles was mocked as the "tree-hugging prince" when he first started talking about many of these issues. Telegdy knows - he's a Brit who worked for the BBC.

"I always thought of him as one of the leading environmental activists on the planet," he said.

The film also includes clips from an interview Prince Charles did about the environment in 1988 with future Nobel Prize winner Al Gore.

The special will air in November, part of NBC Universal's fourth annual week of programming promoting green lifestyles.

Of course this freeloader has one of the more massive carbon footprints known to man, a fact sure to be overlooked in this schlockumentary.

Goodall made use of publicly available records to estimate the prince’s travel and utility bills. He found that Charles was responsible for nearly 1,600 tons of CO2 emissions, the equivalent of more than 600 cars on Britain’s roads for a year.

Flights taken by Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall generated more than 800. They flew more tons of CO2 than 70,000 miles last year, including frequent visits to Scotland and tours of the United States, the Gulf, Pakistan and Africa.

The prince’s foreign air travel has been controversial. In January he travelled first class to the United States with Camilla and 14 aides, where he picked up an environmental awareness award. The two-day tour cost up to £120,000 and generated 54 tons of CO2. In February he hired an Airbus A319, which can seat 140 people, to carry him, Camilla and 23 aides to the Gulf at taxpayers’ expense. The tour, which generated 380 tons of CO2 four press advisers, an equerry, a dresser for the duchess, a hairdresser, two valets, a butler, a doctor, three staff in charge of logistics and travel, and a personal assistant.

When Chuckles jaunts off to the Caribbean, he and his wife really walk the walk, economizing to save the taxpayers unnecessary expense by using a small boat just for two.

Last year this conscientious guardian of the planet embarked on a South American eco-tour and racked up an astounding 322-ton carbon footprint. Meanwhile, last December this oaf jetted in style to meet with the beautiful people in Copenhagen.

PRINCE Charles used up seven months’ worth of the average British person’s “carbon footprint” yesterday flying to Copenhagen on an executive jet to make a speech on climate change.

The heir to the throne, who prides himself on his green credentials, cost taxpayers an estimated £12,000 and racked up a 6.486-ton carbon footprint in one day by taking a seven-seater RAF Royal Flight HS125 jet to the summit in the Danish capital.

This is who NBC deems appropriate to lecture the rest of us about being green.

Maybe they can have Giselle Bundchen come on for a guest appearance.

By the time this chump shows up on NBC, according to his estimate the planet will only have six years left.

PRINCE CHARLES warned world leaders last night they had just seven years to save the world.

In a passionate speech at the UN climate change summit in Copenhagen, Charles described the event as "historic".

He said: "Our planet has reached a point of crisis and we have only seven years before we lose the levers of control."

The prince said mankind had the power to push the planet to the brink but also the ability to bring it back into balance.

He added: "This is an historic moment. I can only appeal to you to listen to the cries of those who are already suffering from the impact of climate change.

"The eyes of the world are upon you and it is no understatement to say that, with your signatures, you can write our future."

Prince Charles said humankind seemed "intent on consuming the planet".

He's sure done more than his share.

George Carlin Celebrates Earth Day

Heard Mark Levin playing this earlier. The late, great George Carlin rips the environmental wackos to shreds. Language warning, of course.

Enjoy.

Environmental Wacko Sentenced For Attempted Firebombing

I blame Al Gore for this leftist culture of violence.

A Texas man who tried to firebomb a condominium development under construction in Pasadena has been sentenced to five years in federal prison.

Prosecutors say 44-year-old Stephen Murphy apologized to the court and to his fiancee Monday before he was sentenced in federal court in Los Angeles.

He pleaded guilty in January to conspiring with another member of the environmental extremist movement Earth Liberation Front to burn down the multimillion-dollar condos with a juice bottle containing gasoline in 2006. The timer attached to the bomb failed.

So due to his incompetence he lucks out and gets only five years.

He should get an additional five for eating tofurky.

Instapundit links. Thanks!

The Perils of Earth Hour: Flaming Cats

Another insipid Earth Hour came and went last Saturday and reports are now coming in showing how dangerous it can be to voluntarily leave yourself in the dark.

The occasion: Earth Hour.

The lights: Off.

The cat: On fire.

A romantic, candlelight dinner in the B.C. environment minister’s house got some unexpected fireworks on Saturday while he and his wife celebrated Earth Hour.

“Suddenly, there was a poof of smoke,” Barry Penner said Tuesday.

He looked over to see that Ranger, the family’s orange-coloured cat, had caught fire while brushing past a candle.

The inquisitive cat, 5, apparently wanted to get in on what was supposed to have been an Earth Hour tete-a-tete for Penner and his wife Daris LaPointe.

The couple rushed to extinguish their pet, but by the time they reached his side, the flames were out, leaving Ranger’s fur singed on one side.

“He looked somewhat disgruntled,” said Penner. “He looked taken aback but he didn’t look afraid. He looked more irritated than anything.”

Candles had been lit around the kitchen and the dining room, as well as on counters and on the table, Penner said.

“This was something new and so he wanted to get a closer look at the candle. He likes to rub against things,” he said.

Within seconds of his brush with destiny, Ranger was demanding rubs, Penner said. The environment minister reported Tuesday Ranger is completely fine, although petting him makes your hand smell like smoke, and his singed fur is curled up, frizzy and brittle.

Left with a house smelling like burnt cat hair left them with a quandary. How to get rid of it?

“We thought about using the fan but we couldn’t do it,” said Penner. They opted instead to open windows to air out the house without using any electricity.

Canada's really in the best of hands.

H/T Tim Blair, who chronicles other moonbat hilarity from up north.

How Green Is Your Love?

It's come to this. A book about practicing environmentally safe sex. All I know is this conjures up disturbing images of sweaty, naked moonbats wearing loincloths and doing the nasty.

Leaving a smaller carbon footprint in the bedroom is easy with Eco-Sex, a green sex guide that will inspire both sexual and ecological excitement. Renew your passion for the environment while you recharge your love life—with green sex toys, low-impact lingerie, fair-trade condoms, bamboo bed linens, conflict-free diamonds, and much more. Eco-Sex will help you avoid the sins of greenwashing while you probe the deeper underpinnings of healthy, chemical-free sex. You’ll also tap into the emerging eco-sexual community while shopping for organic aphrodisiacs or logging onto green dating sites. Eco-Sex will open new avenues for the health of the planet and your body. So go ahead: stock your sexual toolbox, reinvigorate your passions, get serious about sustainability—and join the next (and best!) sexual revolution.

If they wanted to be environmentally friendly they would use paper for this nonsense and would just put it online for free.

Want to know where the author is coming from? See if you can figure out this gibberish.

Everything can be filtered through the lens of astrology. You can chart anything—the birth of a child and the birth of a building. The WTC was in its first (and final) Saturn Return when it went down on 9/11. This was an extremely startling metaphor. Also, Saturn was in Gemini at the time, the sign of twins—the Twin Towers. Freaky.

Bush is currently finishing up his second Saturn return. In 2004, almost every time someone would reveal another appalling character flaw or some egregious lapse in judgment on his part, it coincided with an exact hit of Saturn to his chart. From Richard Clark to the reemergence of those MIA years in the National Guard, it all fit nicely with his Saturn return. In fact, when he made a huge fool of himself during the second debate (the one in which he mentioned "hard work" about eleven times) Saturn was making an exact hit. Despite Saturn, however, he squeaked in. Honestly I've been way too depressed since the election to look into how he avoided a downfall that many astrologers thought inevitable. Give me some time on this one, I'm still in recovery mode.

'I Don’t Think We Should Be Taking Much Notice of What’s on Blogs'

I'm sure his partner in crime, Al Gore, feels the same way. Who knew Gore's "invention" would come back to haunt him like this?

"The IPCC [report] is an assessment, it's not a review," he says, "so the authors have to know something about the subject to assess which are the important papers to bring in to the particular chapter." In doing so, authors naturally would exclude papers that are scientifically weak or irrelevant, argues Jones.

But he fears that the aftermath of the climategate affair is undermining the integrity of the scientific review process. "I don't think we should be taking much notice of what's on blogs because they seem to be hijacking the peer-review process," says Jones.

It is now essential for climate researchers to stand up for their science, he says. "[I'd] like to see the climate science community supporting the climate science more. Lots of them are trying but they're being drowned out."

Aww, they're being drowned out. Well for the past couple of decades we "deniers" have been shouted down and inundated with propaganda every day, our governments are held hostage by environmental extremists, children are terrorized in the classrooms and told the polar bears are dying off and yet poor Phil Jones is being "drowned out."

Heartbreaking, isn't it?

H/T Tim Blair.

Update: See Ed Morrissey's item this morning: Did Nature misreport fraud issue with Jones?

Given that Keenan’s work has been peer reviewed and freely available, it seems at least curious that Nature apparently never attempted to contact Keenan about the allegations he has made in those papers. The description of Keenan as an “amateur” also seems somewhat misleading, given that he has written at least one peer-reviewed paper directly on the subject of misuse of data in climate-change research. Had Nature actually done a little research themselves, they would have known that Jones has not been accused of doing sloppy work, but of deliberately and knowingly using faulty (or at least unsupported) data to support his theories.

Is there any end to the fraud?

The Green Police

This is a commercial to run during the Super Bowl tonight. The scary thing is the environmental wackos would have you arrested for some of these "crimes" in the commercial.

Update: They actually have a Green Police interactive challenge here. Judging by some of the comments, Audi will soon be as popular as Government Motors.

Thanks to Hot Air for the link.

Just 'Plane Stupid': Environmental Wackos Slaughter Polar Bears

Really helping their cause.

Airline pollution activists Plane Stupid are on a collision course with the advertising regulator after launching a graphic cinema campaign that sees CGI polar bears falling to bloody deaths to highlight the impact of carbon emissions.

Plane Stupid's ad, which breaks in cinemas and online today, features dozens of animated polar bears falling from the sky onto a city centre, bouncing off skyscrapers and landing in the street and on the roof of a car, accompanied by blood-spurting special effects.

The only sound, apart from the bone-crunching thump of the impacts, is the steadily increasing whine of a jet airliner's engines.

I guess since the polar bear population has increased so much in recent years they felt the need to kill some off.

Via Tim Blair.

Killing The Rainforest To Fuel Green Energy Is Okay, I Guess

How freaking ridiculous is all of this "green" energy, kumbaya, Al Gore worshiping nonsense getting?

This ridiculous.

A series of biomass-fired plants are being built in the UK that will trigger a 150 per cent surge in timber imports from 20 million tonnes today to 50 million tonnes by 2015, according to the Forestry Commission.
--------------snip-----------------------------
But the plant, which is due to open in 2012, will generate only 300 megawatt hours of electricity, or about 0.4 per cent of the UK's current power-generating capacity. At least four more 300-megawatt plants are planned, including three in Yorkshire that have been proposed by Drax, operator of Britain’s largest coal-fired power station.

It all sounds so silly as to give one a good laugh at the bad joke that all of this environmental Ponzi scheme nonsense has become, except average people are the ones left to pay the price tag while those who are the biggest advocates of such things continue to reap in the profits.

Oh wait, the silliness gets worse and goes beyond simply having to import massive amounts of wood to power their little power plant, which if you were cutting down the wood to make room for say a shopping center, you would face the full wrath of the green community.

Nevertheless, environmental campaigners have raised concerns about the carbon emissions involved in shipping the wood such large distances, while to meet UK pest control laws the timber will need to be baked before it can be shipped to the UK.

Wood industry officials have warned that British families could face soaring prices for a range of wood-based products, including furniture, wood panels and even wallpaper because of its impact on low-grade timber and wood pulp prices.

“It’s going to push timber prices through the roof,” said Gavin Adkins, chairman of the Wood Panel Industry Federation. He is concerned that large parts of the £1 billion industry that rely on wood as its main raw material will be forced offshore.

It wasn't that long ago that California had put people with fireplaces firmly in the crosshairs, telling the rest of the world that those who burn wood are the equivalent of the Al Capones of environmental thieves. So I guess if it is going to be used in some sort of kumbaya "green" project well then it is okay.

The whole article delves into the carbon footprint of harvesting and shipping the wood versus the power generated, but the bottom line is the British consumers wind up paying for it, probably in increased energy bills in addition to the price of wood products.

And in Australia, where they have begun their grand "cap and trade" program, they are now getting the effects of that wonderful program along with probably lining Al Gore's pocket.

THE first bills revealing a nasty 22 per cent hike in electricity prices have sparked a surge in complaints from pensioners and struggling families.

You know, in the real world there is a thing known as best practices, which basically means figure out what it is that makes whoever is number one, number one and then copy it while jettisoning those things that are dragging you down. So far our Congress seems to be looking more at the last place team instead of the first place team.

'The Irony Is Not Lost On Us'

Imagine how many people were hassled by this crew over the years and it turns out they're the biggest polluters around.

The state Department of Ecology in 1996 officially declared Burnt Bridge Creek to be severely polluted with fecal coliform.

The environmental regulators, it turns out, had unwittingly contributed to the problem.

This week, Vancouver city workers made a startling discovery near the regional office shared by Ecology and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife at 2108 Grand Blvd. At some point in the building's history, a sewer pipe that was supposed to be connected to the city's sanitary sewer main had been incorrectly connected to a stormwater line instead.

"The only thing that's supposed to be in the stormwater pipe is rainwater," said Brian Carlson, Vancouver's public works director.

Instead, raw sewage flowed out of the building and into an underground stormwater system that runs for almost a mile. Collecting stormwater runoff from a wide swath of central Vancouver, the intermingled goop dumped directly into Burnt Bridge Creek where it passes under Fourth Plain Boulevard. It is one of 80 stormwater outfalls entering the creek, which ultimately drains into Vancouver Lake.

State employees shut down a pair of restrooms in the building Wednesday.

City officials agreed to repair the problem at the building owner's expense, which should allow agency personnel to go about their business of protecting the environment as usual by next week.

"The irony is not lost on us," Carlson said.

State officials, who lease the building, believe the problem dates back to the 1970s when the building opened as a satellite garden center to a Fred Meyer retail store across Grand Boulevard.

Employees were stunned by the news.

"As a person who loves her area and the environment, it was like, 'Holy crap, let's get this taken care of,'" said Laura Sauermilch, a spill-response specialist who was the first to be informed of the problem by a city worker on Wednesday.

Jay Manning, the agency's state director, called the discovery "embarrassing and upsetting."

Employees immediately posted signs on the doors of the men's and women's restrooms, directing almost 100 workers based in the office to find other alternatives. By Thursday, a half-dozen porta potties and portable hand-washing stations had been brought in.

Melinda Merrill, a Fred Meyer spokeswoman in Portland, said the company constructed the building a few years after the 40,000-square-foot retail center opened across Grand Boulevard in 1968.

Merrill said the retailer intends to cooperate in sharing information, even though it no longer owns the property.

The building's current owner is pressing for a quick resolution.

"I'm just horrified," said J.D. Watumull, vice president of Honolulu-based Watumull Properties. "We're just trying to get it rectified and back to the way it was."

Local and state agencies have yet to sort out the legal matter involving what could be construed as a violation of clean-water laws. Normally, law enforcement is handled by the Department of Ecology.

"We wouldn't automatically leap to a penalty," said Kim Schmanke, an Ecology spokeswoman based in Lacey. "We would look to correct the problem and if it's corrected, then move forward."

Oh, OK, let's just move forward.

If this were any other business they'd be treated like monsters, dragged into court, forced to pay massive penalties and run out of business.

Buyt then the environmentalists themselves are guilty? Eh, let's move forward.

Drill Here! Drill Now!

Or this is what the environmental nutjobs want to protect from the evil oil consumers. That would be you and me.
H/T Dupray at Flopping Aces.

And over on Hot Air they have yet another example of activist judges doing their best to block America from tapping into and utilizing our own natural resources. Everybody is preaching about saving our resources and my question is saving them for what?

But the judge ruled the Forest Service didn’t consider how degrading the area could harm tourism, and said the agency did a “woefully inadequate” job of evaluating how the drilling might affect the Kirtland’s warbler, an endangered songbird that nests in the area.