The Climate Minute - Spring brings...?

Spring officially showed up last week, and spring in Massachusetts means: Lilac Sunday? Maple sugaring?  Yes... and town meeting!  Rob and Ted talk a little about town meeting, a little about Keystone and fracking, and some Mauna Loa and Mayor Menino to fill out the bill.  Grab a cup  of joe and settle in for this week's Climate Minute. As always, click on the “MCAN Climate Minute” picture to the right to start the recording in a new window. With concern about fracking continuing to grow, more communities may try to regulate fracking activities on the local level.  This will result in more cases like the one in Dryden, New York, where the industry is seeking to avoid a patchwork series of regulations. Could you use a primer on fracking and its consequences?  Huffington Post has a nice roundup of fracking info sources. In the "oh sure, why not" category comes a story that Oklahoma researchers are drawing a connection between hydraulic injection processes used in oil drilling with earthquakes.   While the process used in oil production is slightly different from the process used in natural gas production, fears that fracking will lead to more destructive earthquake activity seems to have some basis. Keystone continues to be in the news, and the comment period is supposed to close in mid April.  In spite of the lingering concern over the CV's of the report consultants, the State Department has taken the position that comments on the DEIS will remain confidential. Sick and tired of your climate denier friends extolling the virtues of a 1,200 mile pipeline carrying toxic "dilbit" down the backbone of this nation?  Climate Progress has a sarcastic list of the "benefits" of Keystone -- memorize two or three to give back to your friends. Here's my sarcastic addition: Oh, I'm sure you can build a 1,200 mile pipeline that won't leak or crosses any streams... Again, the website Credo has made it easy to submit an electronic comment on the Keystone pipeline Draft EIS here.  They'll provide you with a generic comment text which you can change, and they'll electronically deliver the comment for you.  They have collected 68% of the signatures they need to reach their goal of delivering 200,000 comments on the pipeline. As climate activists, we have internalized the idea that global carbon dioxide levels are rising from year to year. Indeed this is the bedrock on which we make our case that clean energy is needed. Most of us have seen a chart showing a squiggly but rising line representing CO2 levels, and some even know it as the ‘Mauna Loa” data. This makes it is worthwhile to note that the Mauna Loa curve, better known in scientific circles as the Keeling Curve , turns fifty-five this year. It was in March, 1958 that Dr.  Charles David Keeling began making the longest continuous record of CO2 levels available today. Spring also brings town meeting season.  Those of you living in New England have the grand pleasure and terrible responsibility to practice direct democracy in its purest form as town meeting convene across the state.  For some history and perspective on town meeting, here's an interesting article.  You can find your town's website address here.  Usually the town meeting warrant will be posted and you can familiarize yourself with what's up for debate before you attend. Speaking of local government, we would like to close with an acknowledgement of Mayor Menino's announcement of his retirement.  If your a college junior and you grew up in Boston, there has not been a mayor but Tom Menino.  Mayor Menino is a classic example of a quietly powerful Mayor.  His predecessors - the urbane Kevin White and sharp-elbowed Ray Flynn - perhaps cut larger figures, but no one exercised the degree of control over Boston for the amount of time Tom Menino did.  Under Menino's governance Boston has been a model of forward-thinking on climate and energy, and we wish him all the best. It's been a pleasure sharing climate news and views with you as always.  You know, you can subscribe to our iTunes feed and get our podcasts automatically here.  Feel free to give us your thoughts on our Facebook page, or through old-fashioned email. Remember, for climate activities near you check out our MCAN climate action calendar.  You can enter events as well as browse for interesting things to do. As always -- remember, for these reasons we have discussed, the United States must place a price on carbon.  See you next week.