We could get rid of fossil fuels . . .

What is it called when you can save many lives, but you don't? Homocide? Terracide? Scientists insist that we can wean ourselves from fossil fuels, and it would be a win win win. It's going to be very difficult when we are bombarded with so incredibly much "clean-coal" and "clean natural gas" propaganda. But here's what we COULD do, from Stanford:

If someone told you there was a way you could save 2.5 million to 3 million lives a year and simultaneously halt global warming, reduce air and water pollution and develop secure, reliable energy sources – nearly all with existing technology and at costs comparable with what we spend on energy today – why wouldn't you do it? According to a new study coauthored by Stanford researcher Mark Z. Jacobson, we could accomplish all that by converting the world to clean, renewable energy sources and forgoing fossil fuels. "Based on our findings, there are no technological or economic barriers to converting the entire world to clean, renewable energy sources," said Jacobson, a professor of civil and environmental engineering. "It is a question of whether we have the societal and political will."

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Fossil fuel industry attacks plan for zero carbon in 2030.

More clear than ever, every political issue is about campaign finance reform and media reform. The fossil fuel industry (The American Gas Association (AGA) is in the process of gutting Section 433 of the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA). Section 433 requires new federal buildings and major renovations…

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EPA shuts down fracking study critical of industry

From Propublica:

When the Environmental Protection Agency abruptly retreated on its multimillion-dollar investigation into water contamination in a central Wyoming natural gas field last month, it shocked environmentalists and energy industry supporters alike. In 2011, the agency had issued a blockbuster draft report saying that the controversial practice of fracking was to blame for the pollution of an aquifer deep below the town of Pavillion, Wy. – the first time such a claim had been based on a scientific analysis. The study drew heated criticism over its methodology and awaited a peer review that promised to settle the dispute. Now the EPA will instead hand the study over to the state of Wyoming, whose research will be funded by EnCana, the very drilling company whose wells may have caused the contamination.

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About the renewed Fossil Fuel Resistance

Bill McKibben explains the degree of the threat of fossil fuel in the April 25, 2013 issue of Rolling Stone.  Here's the opening paragraph:

It got so hot in Australia in January that the weather service had to add two new colors to its charts. A few weeks later, at the other end of the planet, new data from the CryoSat-2 satellite showed 80 percent of Arctic sea ice has disappeared. We're not breaking records anymore; we're breaking the planet. In 50 years, no one will care about the fiscal cliff or the Euro crisis. They'll just ask, "So the Arctic melted, and then what did you do?"
And consider the opportunities being lost to a continued dependence on fossil fuels:
It's an economic resistance movement, too, one that's well aware renewable energy creates three times as many jobs as coal and gas and oil. Good jobs that can't be outsourced because the sun and the wind are close to home. It creates a future, in other words.

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