Hurricane Marie Could Swallow Smaller Storm Karina

Hurricane Marie Could Swallow Smaller Storm Karina

Wednesday, August 27, 2014 / No Comments

Space Images show the enormous hurricane Marie is about to swallow another small storm in the Pacific coast of Mexico.

Recently released NASA photos show severe storms and small swirls together. The images were taken by (NOAA) Earth Observation of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's GOES-West satellite yesterday (August 26) at 8 pm EDT (17:00 PDT).

Karina, but maybe not for an hour of substantial snack Marie devours. With winds decreased to 30 mph (48 km / h), Karina weakened by a tropical depression in a low-pressure system is the last night, having traveled across the Pacific for two weeks, the National Hurricane Center (NHC ) announced.

Mary, meanwhile, is already sending strong waves off the coast of California. As large as 15 feet (4.6 meters) Swells hit beaches around Los Angeles yesterday, a surfer was pronounced dead in Malibu after being removed from the choppy waters, according to the Los Angeles Times. Hurricane Marie surf conditions are likely to produce common and deadly areas in southern California and Baja California in Mexico until tomorrow (August 28), according to the NHC.

Marie is currently about 810 miles (1300 km) west of the southern tip of Baja California. It is expected that storm with winds up to 85 mph (140 km / h), but to weaken as it moves over cooler waters in the coming days, the NHC said in its latest update officials.

NOAA GOES satellites are geostationary, meaning that stands in the same spot above the Earth all the time, orbiting in tandem with the planet's rotation. Satellites captured images of clouds that are used by the National Weather Service NOAA to track storms. The GOES-West satellite provides coverage for much of western North America and the Pacific.

Pipeline emissions up to four times worse than predicted

Pipeline emissions up to four times worse than predicted

Monday, August 25, 2014 / No Comments

The Keystone XL pipeline would carry crude oil from Canada to refineries and barges farther south.

North America's proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline could significantly increase greenhouse-gas emissions, suggests an analysis published on 10 August in Nature Climate Change.
The pipeline carrying up to 830,000 barrels of oil a day from tar sands in western Canada to the Midwestern United States, where it would connect with existing pipelines operating in the Gulf of Mexico. The economic model used in the latest study suggests that this extra oil could lower prices and consumption, producing the equivalent of 110 million tons of carbon dioxide a year. (This is equivalent to about 1.7% of total GHG emissions in the United States in 2012, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.)

In essence, each additional barrel of oil produced as a result of Keystone XL increase the overall consumption of 0.6 barrels, the study finds. "If that's the case, would be a major impact of greenhouse gases," says co-author Peter Erickson, senior researcher of the Institute of the Stockholm Environment in Seattle, Washington.

Pollution problem
Keystone XL has been the subject of intense debate in the United States and Canada since it was proposed by TransCanada pipeline company in 2008 The decision on whether to proceed with the construction ultimately rests with President Barack Obama, who said he supports the pipeline if "does not significantly increase the problem of carbon pollution." An evaluation by the State Department of the United States has concluded that Keystone XL would increase emissions of only 1.3 million tonnes to 27.4 million tonnes of CO2 a year.
But Erickson and his co-author Michael Lazarus say that the economic model of the State Department did not consider the effect of the pipeline on world oil prices, and therefore consumption. Because the State Department did not disclose all the details of their model, the authors of the latter study can not be certain of the variables used in the analysis of government. A State Department spokesman declined to comment on the article in Nature Climate Change.
David Victor, an expert on climate policy at the University of California, San Diego, said the production of oil from tar sands in Canada will increase regardless of whether Keystone XL is becoming a reality. Provide additional oil by rail could be a little more expensive than oil transport by pipeline, but that would reduce the profits of oil companies slightly, Victor said. "It's very difficult to stop the oil," he added.

Critics of Keystone XL Ken Caldeira, an atmospheric scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Stanford, California, says that the price effects of the pipeline are to some extent irrelevant. "My concern is not so much the increase in emissions of Keystone XL, Keystone XL but is part of a larger pattern of behavior," he said. If the pipeline were to be canceled, that "signals to the market that these pollutants will not approve projects," says Caldeira.

Others are skeptical that any incremental oil production allowed by Keystone XL could push oil prices. The study shows "a reasonable history," said Maximilian Auffhammer, an environmental economist at the University of California, Berkeley. But the oil industry might react to a cheaper oil production limits, which would increase prices - and, in principle, reduce fuel consumption and emissions.
Erickson acknowledged that his analysis is not the final outcome. But he says that this shows why the price effects should be taken into account for the Keystone and other energy developments. "These are the types of questions that must be analyzed," he said.