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<p><i><font size="+1"><b>May 10, 2021</b></font></i></p>
<font size="+1">[Looking for confirmation]</font><br>
<font size="+1"><b>US invokes emergency powers after cyberattack
shuts crucial fuel pipeline<br>
</b>Biden administration in ‘all-hands-on-deck’ effort to avoid
shortages after Colonial Pipeline targeted in worst-ever attack on
US infrastructure<br>
</font><br>
<font size="+1">The Biden administration has invoked emergency
powers as part of an “all-hands-on-deck” effort to avoid fuel
shortages after the worst-ever cyber-attack on US infrastructure
shut down a crucial pipeline supplying the east coast.<br>
<br>
The federal transport department issued an emergency declaration
on Sunday to relax regulations for drivers carrying gasoline,
diesel, jet fuel and other refined petroleum products in 17 states
and the District of Columbia. It lets them work extra or more
flexible hours to make up for any fuel shortage related to the
pipeline outage.<br>
<br>
Experts said on Sunday that gasoline prices were unlikely to be
affected if the pipeline was back to normal in the next few days
but that the incident should serve as a wake-up call to companies
about the vulnerabilities they face.<br>
</font><br>
<font size="+1">The pipeline, operated by Georgia-based Colonial
Pipeline, carries gasoline and other fuel from Texas to the
north-east. It delivers roughly 45% of fuel consumed on the east
coast, according to the company.<br>
<br>
It was hit by what Colonial called a ransomware attack, in which
hackers typically lock up computer systems by encrypting data,
paralysing networks, and then demand a large ransom to unscramble
it.<br>
<br>
On Sunday, Colonial Pipeline said it was actively in the process
of restoring some of its IT systems. It said it remains in contact
with law enforcement and other federal agencies, including the
energy department, which is leading the federal government
response.<br>
<br>
The company has not said what was demanded or who made the demand.<br>
<br>
However, two people close to the investigation, speaking on
condition of anonymity, identified the culprit as DarkSide. It is
among ransomware gangs that have “professionalised” a criminal
industry that has cost western nations tens of billions of dollars
in losses in the past three years.<br>
<br>
DarkSide claims that it does not attack hospitals and nursing
homes, educational or government targets and that it donates a
portion of its take to charity. It has been active since August
and, typical of the most potent ransomware gangs, is known to
avoid targeting organisations in former Soviet bloc nations.<br>
<br>
Colonial did not say whether it has paid or was negotiating a
ransom, and DarkSide did not announce the attack on its dark
website. The lack of acknowledgment usually indicates a victim is
either negotiating or has paid.<br>
<br>
On Sunday, Colonial Pipeline said it was developing a “system
restart” plan. It said its main pipeline remains offline but some
smaller lines are now operational.<br>
<br>
“We are in the process of restoring service to other laterals and
will bring our full system back online only when we believe it is
safe to do so, and in full compliance with the approval of all
federal regulations,” the company said in a statement.<br>
<br>
Colonial transports gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and home heating
oil from refineries on the Gulf coast through pipelines running
from Texas to New Jersey. Its pipeline system spans more than
5,500 miles (8,850km), transporting more than 100m gallons (380m
litres) a day.<br>
<br>
Debnil Chowdhury at the research firm IHSMarkit said that if the
outage stretched to one to three weeks, gas prices could begin to
rise.<br>
<br>
“I wouldn’t be surprised, if this ends up being an outage of that
magnitude, if we see 15- to 20-cent rise in gas prices over next
week or two,” he said.<br>
<br>
Gina Raimondo, commerce secretary, said on Sunday that ransomware
attacks were “what businesses now have to worry about,” and that
she would work “very vigorously” with homeland security officials
to address the problem, calling it a top priority for the
administration.<br>
<br>
“Unfortunately, these sorts of attacks are becoming more
frequent,” she said on CBS’ Face the Nation. “We have to work in
partnership with business to secure networks to defend ourselves
against these attacks.”<br>
<br>
She said president Joe Biden was briefed on the attack.<br>
<br>
“It’s an all-hands-on-deck effort right now,” Raimondo said. “And
we are working closely with the company, state and local officials
to make sure that they get back up to normal operations as quickly
as possible and there aren’t disruptions in supply.”<br>
<br>
One of the people close to the Colonial investigation said that
the attackers also stole data from the company. Sometimes stolen
data is more valuable to ransomware criminals than the leverage
they gain by crippling a network, because some victims are loath
to see sensitive information of theirs dumped online.<br>
<br>
Ed Amoroso, boss of security firm TAG Cyber, said Colonial was
lucky its attacker was at least ostensibly motivated only by
profit, not geopolitics. State-backed hackers bent on more serious
destruction use the same intrusion methods as ransomware gangs.<br>
<br>
“For companies vulnerable to ransomware, it’s a bad sign because
they are probably more vulnerable to more serious attacks,” he
said. Russian cyberwarriors, for example, crippled the electrical
grid in Ukraine during the winters of 2015 and 2016.<br>
<br>
In the US, attacks have forced delays in cancer treatment at
hospitals, interrupted schooling and paralysed police and city
governments. Tulsa this week became the 32nd state or local
government in the U.S. to come under ransomware attack, said Brett
Callow, a threat analyst with the cybersecurity firm Emsisoft.<br>
</font><font size="+1"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/10/us-invokes-emergency-powers-after-cyberattack-shuts-crucial-fuel-pipeline">https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/10/us-invokes-emergency-powers-after-cyberattack-shuts-crucial-fuel-pipeline</a><br>
</font>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<font size="+1">[new guidance]</font><br>
<font size="+1"><b>Humans already have the tools to combat climate
change but we lack leadership</b></font><br>
<font size="+1">In this extract, top atmospheric scientist Dave Lowe
explains why despite political inaction he believes we can build a
sustainable future</font><br>
<font size="+1">Dave Lowe 9 May 2021<br>
</font><br>
<font size="+1">When it comes to the political will and leadership
needed to drive the world towards a sustainable future, I’m a
pessimist. Time and time again, I’ve heard rhetoric from
politicians focusing on short-term goals at the expense of
planning for the future. In 2021, the mainstream media promote
responsible journalism and take a hard line with climate deniers.
Many journalists hold governments to account over climate change
goals. However, hard scientific data is often still manipulated
and cherrypicked by politicians. I’ve spoken to many and liken the
experience to walking through treacle.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Does their bland decision-making have to do with the
structure of democracy itself, with its short electoral terms and
lack of incentives for incumbent politicians to make hard and
binding decisions for the decades ahead?</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">As I look around and see New Zealand’s highways,
jammed with huge diesel trucks and ever-increasing numbers of
petrol-powered SUVs and cars, I feel dread. It doesn’t have to be
this way. What is it about living on a finite planet that humans
either don’t or won’t understand, after all the studies and
warnings show that continuing in this way leads to the inevitable
collapse of the planet’s ecosystems?</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">When you look at the true cost of the damage to the
atmosphere, politicians’ claims that action on carbon reduction is
too expensive become bizarre. When we burn fossil fuels, we’ve
never factored in the ultimate cost of the damage to the
atmosphere caused by excess CO2. In many countries, if you pollute
a waterway, you have to clean it up or pay a substantial fee for
the damage – that cost has to be factored in to the cost of
running your business. In the case of emitting CO2 into the
atmosphere, you can do that for little or no upfront and immediate
cost. Are we offended by people polluting waterways because it is
literally in your face whereas CO2 is a transparent gas?</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">US invokes emergency powers after cyberattack shuts
crucial fuel pipeline</font><br>
<font size="+1">For most of the last few decades I have been
disappointed with the lack of action on carbon emissions
reductions by politicians. But on the other hand, I’m very
optimistic when it comes to the extraordinary ingenuity of human
beings. We already have the tools to combat climate change. The
last two decades have seen massive advances in renewable energy
electricity generation to the point where these sources are now
cheaper than equivalent coal-burning power plants, even before the
cost of damage to the atmosphere is taken into account. The
International Energy Agency (IEA) reported that, in 2019, almost
30% of OECD electricity was met by renewable sources including
hydro, solar, wind, biomass and geothermal.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Crucial to the urgent transition towards a low
carbon future will be the skills and experience of engineers. Over
the years I’ve spoken to many groups of engineers, including oil
and gas engineers, about climate change. You’d think that a
climate scientist talking to a gas engineer would lead to an
argument, but that has not been my experience.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Those same gas and other engineers who have been so
maligned by the green movement have the vital skills needed in a
new sustainable economy.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Their skills are transferable to an economy making
widescale use of “green hydrogen”, for example. Green hydrogen,
produced by electrolysis of water using excess electricity derived
from wind and other renewable energy sources, is already being
used in steelmaking, energy storage and transport in Germany and a
number of other countries.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">When I talk to people about this technology and its
possibilities, they are astonished. They wonder why they have
never heard of it. Hydrogen fuel cell technology has been around a
long time – I remember first seeing it decades ago. Why hasn’t it
been used? Several reasons come to mind, including conspiracy
theories about the oil companies, but to me there is a simple
answer. It’s because products made from fossil fuels appear to be
so much cheaper than sustainable alternatives; the true cost of
the climate emergency is never factored in when the products are
sold to customers.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">So what is the true cost of the damage to the
atmosphere when you emit a couple of tonnes of CO2 into it,
perhaps during a longhaul flight between Auckland and London or by
running a diesel-powered SUV for a year? There are a lot of
different answers to that question depending on whether you ask an
economist, politician, engineer or a climate scientist.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">If you ask a chemist how, and how much it would
cost, to remove a tonne of CO2 from the atmosphere, they would
probably throw up their hands in horror, come up with a figure of
NZ$1,000 per tonne and a very complex apparatus. A climate
scientist would reply to the question with another, like, “How
much do you think the 2020 wildfires in Australia, California,
Colorado, Siberia and the Arctic cost?” And a New Zealand
economist would quote the current carbon price on the New Zealand
emissions trading scheme site, which in early 2021 was about NZ$37
per tonne. To me that sounds ridiculously cheap, measuring in
crude economic terms the cost of the damage by carbon emissions
into our only atmosphere.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">We’ve been blinkered into thinking that there are no
alternatives to fossil fuels for running an economy and society.
But engineers and economists can point to several alternatives,
and we need to adopt the ones that provide a sustainable future in
this decade. A new field has emerged which has come to be known as
“transition engineering”, where engineering and scientific
principles are used to provide systems which do not compromise the
ecological, societal and economic systems that future generations
will depend on.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Engineering solutions will be especially valuable in
tackling the rapidly growing emissions from transport. Worldwide,
liquid fuels like petrol and diesel for cars and trucks, jet fuel
for aviation and bunker fuels for shipping accounted for more than
20% of total CO2 emissions in 2016. Growing at a faster rate than
any other sector, transport poses a major challenge to reducing
emissions in line with the Paris Agreement. To keep global
temperature rise within a range that averts the worst climate
impacts, IPCC and other climate modelling show transport emissions
must decline. Transitioning to zero-emission transport is crucial.
Solutions include clean fuels, improved vehicle efficiency,
changes to how we move people and goods, and building sustainable
cities.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Electrification eliminates tailpipe emissions of CO2
and particles that damage our lungs. It harnesses the potential to
decarbonise the power grid.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">There is no doubt that reducing carbon emissions to
avert disastrous impacts of climate change will be a gigantic
undertaking. No single solution to this problem exists. It will
require concerted effort from all parts of society, above all
governments, but also engineers, scientists, economists, teachers
and farmers. We can feel optimistic of the rapidly emerging
technologies available to help reduce carbon emissions, among them
hydrogen generation and storage from surplus electricity,
synthesis of sugars from CO2 and water, information and
nanotechnology, bioengineering and educational science to name a
few. The challenges ahead are formidable but I truly believe that,
given the will and with concerted action, human beings are more
than capable of building a sustainable future.</font><br>
<font size="+1"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/10/humans-already-have-the-tools-to-combat-climate-change-but-we-lack-leadership">https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/10/humans-already-have-the-tools-to-combat-climate-change-but-we-lack-leadership</a></font><br>
<font size="+1"></font>
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</font></p>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<font size="+1">[oops, another factor]</font><br>
<font size="+1"><b>Scientists fear more lung cancer as radon is
released from thawing permafrost</b><br>
Scientists from the Russian Academy of Sciences hypothesize that
as the melting of the permafrost becomes more prevalent, so will
the incidence of lung cancer.<br>
</font><br>
<font size="+1">Massive amounts of uranium are stored in high
concentrations underground throughout the Arctic zone. A product
of uranium decay is radon gas. Normally, radon is contained in the
soil by layers of ground and snow atop of it. However, as
permafrost thaws, the radioactive gas seeps out from underground
and is released into the atmosphere.<br>
<br>
The link between thawing permafrost and increased risk of lung
cancer is presented by researchers with the Federal Center for
Comprehensive Study of the Arctic with the Russian Academy of
Science.<br>
<br>
When humans respire radon gas, their lungs are exposed to
radiation. Radon is naturally present in air in small amounts. On
average, about 0.4 pCi/L of radon can be expected to compose the
air. In such small amounts, breathing in radon is fairly harmless,
according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
However, through constant exposure to the gas or to more
concentrated quantities of it, the lining of the lungs get
damaged. This in turn, increases the chances of developing lung
cancer. According to EPA, radon gas is the second greatest
contributor to lung cancer after smoking.<br>
<br>
Permafrost thawing caused by climate changes is going to increase
atmospheric radon levels, which will have horrible health effects
on humans and animals in the region, according to the Russian
science study.<br>
<br>
As radon gas is both odorless and colorless, it is difficult to
sensory identify. Arctic animals will not instinctively know that
they are in danger. They are likely to continue living in the area
but will be increasingly dying prematurely due to higher cancer
rates. Local populations will also have difficulty identifying
dangerously high levels of the gas without the proper equipment.<br>
</font><font size="+1">- -<br>
</font><font size="+1">Atmospheric radon gas increase is yet another
frightening side effect of climate change to be added to the
myriad of the already existing ones. As the evidence of doom
amasses, it is necessary to act before it is too late.<br>
</font><font size="+1"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/climate-crisis/2021/05/scientists-fear-more-lung-cancer-radon-released-thawing-permafrost">https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/climate-crisis/2021/05/scientists-fear-more-lung-cancer-radon-released-thawing-permafrost</a><br>
</font>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<font size="+1">[Yale]</font><br>
<font size="+1"><b>Revitalized U.S. urgency on climate change and
national security</b></font><br>
<font size="+1">The Biden administration’s national security
concerns over climate change mark a sharp shift from the Trump
administration approach.</font><br>
<font size="+1">by SAMANTHA HARRINGTON - MAY 7, 2021</font><br>
<i><font size="+1"><b>- - </b></font></i><br>
<font size="+1">Climate change intersects with national security in
several ways. Climate change directly threatens military bases and
personnel through higher temperatures, continued sea-level rise,
and other extreme weather events, and can worsen the impacts of
some natural disasters. </font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">“I served for a period of time in Norfolk, Virginia,
as an environmental lawyer, and that’s the largest Navy base in
the world,” Nevitt said. “The seas are rising, the soil is
sinking. How are we going to adapt for this and save the
infrastructure?”</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Sikorsky added that climate change likely will lead
to more humanitarian and disaster-relief missions in the U.S. and
around the world.</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">The global trends report also addresses more
indirect ways that climate change is expected to intersect with
national security. The key takeaways cited in the report are that:</font><br>
<blockquote><font size="+1">- The developing world will bear some of
the worst natural disasters which will intensify risks to food,
water, health, and energy security.</font><br>
<font size="+1">- The demand for energy and carbon dioxide removal
technologies will grow increasingly desperate, leading to more
calls for geoengineering, “despite possibly dire consequences.”</font><br>
<font size="+1">- Countries will debate over required sacrifices
and concessions as the world moves toward net-zero emissions.
The burdens and benefits won’t be equal across all nations,
leading to heightened competition, increased instability,
strained military readiness, and more political discord.</font><br>
</blockquote>
<font size="+1">Overall, climate change adds an extra layer of
analysis to all security risks. “If you don’t take climate change
into account, then your interventions are going to be lacking,”
Sikorsky said. “You’re going to miss some things because you’re
not building resilience to what we know is coming in terms of the
climate shocks.”...</font><br>
<font size="+1">- -</font><br>
<font size="+1">Nevitt’s only qualm? He is concerned the report may
be overly optimistic about how much the international community
can agree on a critical point: quickly reducing, and perhaps also
eliminating, greenhouse gas emissions in order to prevent exceding
1.5°C of warming even earlier than the report expects</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Looking toward 2040</font><br>
<font size="+1">Sikorsky and Nevitt both say they hope national
security professionals continue to move toward a broader
definition of what security is, so that it fully encompasses
climate change matters. </font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">“It’s one of those things we’ve kind of had, even
under the Trump administration, you had a grassroots effort among
many agencies of younger folks who had come in saying, look, we
got to put this issue front and center,” Sikorsky said. “What was
missing was folks at the higher level.”</font><br>
<br>
<font size="+1">Nevitt also said that the COVID-19 pandemic has led
to a reframing of national security beyond just threats from
foreoign governments or alien organizations: The pandemic has
shown clearly that non-traditional threats can be just as deadly
as conventional ones...</font><br>
<font size="+1"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2021/05/revitalized-u-s-urgency-on-climate-change-and-national-security/">https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2021/05/revitalized-u-s-urgency-on-climate-change-and-national-security/</a></font><br>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<font size="+1">[Yale - misinformation age - video discussion]</font><br>
<font size="+1"><b>Are Scientific Models Fictions? Model-Based
Science as Epistemic Warfare, Post-Talk Conversation</b><br>
Apr 30, 2021<br>
YaleUniversity<br>
In the current epistemological debate, scientific models are not
only considered as useful devices for explaining facts or
discovering new entities, laws, and theories. They are also
rubricated under various new labels: from the classical ones, as
abstract entities and idealizations, to the more recent, as
fictions, surrogates, credible worlds, missing systems,
make-believe, parables, functional, epistemic actions, revealing
capacities. Professor Magnani will discuss these approaches,
showing some of their epistemological inadequacies and also taking
advantage of recent results in cognitive science. The main aim is
to revise and criticize fictionalism, reframing the received idea
of abstractness and ideality of models with the help of recent
results coming from the area of distributed cognition (common
coding) and abductive cognition (manipulative).<br>
Post-Talk Conversation between Lorenzo Magnani, Department of
Humanities, Philosophy Section and Computational Philosophy
Laboratory, University of Pavia, Italy and James Weatherall,
Department of Logic and Philosophy of Science, University of
California, Irvine<br>
</font><font size="+1"><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://youtu.be/APTnRpZXO6E">https://youtu.be/APTnRpZXO6E</a><br>
</font>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
<p><font size="+1"><br>
</font></p>
[EPA regulates CO2]<br>
By Lisa Friedman - Published May 3, 2021<br>
<b>E.P.A. to Sharply Limit Powerful Greenhouse Gases</b><br>
The Biden administration is moving quickly to limit
hydrofluorocarbons, the Earth-warming chemicals used in
air-conditioning and refrigeration.<br>
<br>
WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency moved on Monday to
sharply reduce the use and production of powerful greenhouse gases
central to refrigeration and air-conditioning, part of the Biden
administration’s larger strategy of trying to slow the pace of
global warming.<br>
<br>
The agency proposed to regulate hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, a class
of man-made chemicals that are thousands of times more potent than
carbon dioxide at warming the planet. The proposal is the first
significant step the E.P.A. has taken under President Biden to curb
climate change.<br>
<br>
The move is also the first time the federal government has set
national limits on HFCs, which were used to replace ozone-depleting
chlorofluorocarbons in the 1980s but have turned out to be a
significant driver of global warming. More than a dozen states have
either banned HFCs or are formulating some restrictions...<br>
- -<br>
Under the plan, the E.P.A. will set a baseline for the amount of
HFCs that are produced and consumed, and use that to establish a cap
on the levels that can be created and imported into the United
States. The agency will then establish a methodology for allocating
allowances to companies to continue producing and importing HFCs for
the years 2022 and 2023, as well as developing an enforcement
system.<br>
<br>
Under the law, allowances to companies will gradually decrease as
the market for alternatives grows. There will be a 45-day comment
period before the E.P.A. moves to finalize the regulation.<br>
<br>
In the last days of the Obama administration, 197 nations, including
the United States, signed the Kigali accord to phase out HFCs.
President Donald J. Trump never brought the agreement to the Senate
for ratification. Mr. Biden has pledged to send the Kigali amendment
to the Senate.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/03/climate/EPA-HFCs-hydrofluorocarbons.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/03/climate/EPA-HFCs-hydrofluorocarbons.html</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[activism by divestment]<b><br>
</b><b>Climate Justice Is About More Than Just Fossil Fuels</b><br>
A true commitment to climate justice is much broader: It necessarily
entails building local resilience to climate impacts.<br>
By Matthew Sehrsweeney - MAY 7, 2021<br>
- -<br>
For example, in March, after nearly a decade of intense pressure
from student organizers, the University of Michigan announced full
divestment from fossil fuels. The week prior to the announcement,
the university released its carbon neutrality plan—also the subject
of intense pressure—which aims to achieve university-wide true
carbon neutrality by 2040.<br>
<br>
At first glance, it looks like UM is acknowledging its massive
responsibility in mitigating the climate crisis and charting a bold
path to make good on it—and indeed, these steps are monumental:
Michigan’s endowment is the first of the world’s top 10 largest
university endowments to divest.<br>
<br>
But campus climate activists here and elsewhere should not be so
easily satisfied...<br>
- - <br>
Divestment from fossil fuels and carbon neutrality are a step in the
right direction, but not nearly enough—now is not a moment for
partial measures; it is a moment for radical transformation.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/climate-justice/">https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/climate-justice/</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
[long video of Elon Musk chats around the table for hours - in his
home as he tries to sell his bitcoin - revealing his understanding
of global warming - this may indicate a bubble]<br>
<b>Elon Musk SNL / Reveals When DOGE Hit $7 / Dogecoin to the MOON
NOW!!! /</b><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://youtu.be/bUwDw20yOTM">https://youtu.be/bUwDw20yOTM</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Fire in the ice]<br>
<b>Ice on fire: first wildfires are registered around the world’s
Pole of Cold in Yakutia</b><br>
By Svetlana Skarbo, Valeria Sukhova -4 May 2021<br>
Could burning ground in an area as extremely cold as Oymyakon be
caused by zombie fires?<br>
The air temperature in the Oymyakon district of Yakutia is still
negative at nights, with daytime just about climbing over 1C.<br>
<br>
Snow is beginning to melt, but rivers are still locked in ice for at
least a couple weeks more - which is completely normal for Oymyakon,
the coldest permanently inhabited settlement on Earth.<br>
<br>
What is abnormal is the sight of a dozen wildfires burning a short
distance north and south from this famous Pole of Cold. <br>
<br>
The first was registered as unusually early as 29 April by the
settlement of Teryut, a short distance north from Oymyakon. <br>
<br>
Sentinel-2 satellite caught sight of frozen Indigirka River,
snow-covered mountains, and ominous dark-orange dots scattered along
the valleys...<br>
- -<br>
The second set of fires was recorded south of Oymyakon and even
closer by distance (within 20km, or 12 milds) on 1 May. <br>
<br>
Last summer was one of the worst in the history of Yakutia for the
number of wildfires, with many registered above the Arctic circle. <br>
<br>
Russia’s largest and coldest region reported fires all around its
territory, with a massive blanket of smoke visible from space in the
far north beside the Arctic Ocean. <br>
<br>
At the end of autumn 2020 a report in Tomponsky Vestnik newspaper
made clear that one such fire was still burning outside the village
of Udarnik - the area that suffered badly in summer wildfires.<br>
The video, filmed in November at -25C (-13F) showed pillars of smoke
rising above a field outside the village, with worried residents
commenting that summer fires had not stopped.<br>
<br>
Several months later we asked local journalists to check if the
smoke was still visible in the same location - and it was, with the
ground feeling ‘like rubber’ as they walked along a field. <br>
<br>
The video below was filmed at -30C (-22F) after months of extremely
cold winter with air temperatures plummeting in December and January
2021 to as low as -60C (-76F). <br>
<br>
This kind of fire - most often in peat, or young coal, or a mixture
of both - is often described as a ‘zombie fire’.<br>
Such blazes can go on for weeks and months. In some situations they
are next to impossible to extinguish.<br>
<br>
Siberia has a number of such fires - further south, but now they are
present in the far north. <br>
<br>
‘This winter peat and charcoal underground fire outside Udarnik was
caused by summer wildfires that didn’t stop till late Autumn. It
wasn’t diminished by weeks of rain, which is typical for peat fires
as they can go many metres down, creating extremely dangerous
burning ‘pockets’ where a man or an animal would burn alive within
minutes. Peat fires don’t need oxygen from outside, and ‘like’ cold
snowy winters because snow acts like a blanket that supports
burning’, said ex-forester Lyubov Vasilyeva, from the Tomponsky
district of Yakutia.<br>
<br>
Lyubov, 62, believes that it was the collapse of the Soviet Union
that started a long chain of events leading to the current zombie
fires. <br>
<br>
‘There was a system of controlled burning of dry grass, with
specialists - who had maps with peat bogs and coal deposits marked -
supervising the process,’ she said, recalling the past. <br>
<br>
'It died in the early ‘90s, and nothing new was created, with people
burning grass uncontrollably and without knowledge. <br>
<br>
‘This results in massive summer wildfires, with some of them turning
into zombie fires’, she said. <br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/ice-on-fire-first-wildfires-are-registered-around-the-worlds-pole-of-cold-in-yakutia/">https://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/ice-on-fire-first-wildfires-are-registered-around-the-worlds-pole-of-cold-in-yakutia/</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Digging back into the internet news archive - defeat for open
information]<br>
<font size="+1"><b>On this day in the history of global warming May
10, 2005 </b></font><br>
The US Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rules
that the White House does not have to disclose information regarding
the infamous 2001 Cheney Energy Task Force.<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/10/politics/10cnd-cheney.html?_r=0">http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/10/politics/10cnd-cheney.html?_r=0</a><br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4647599">http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4647599</a><br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/05/11/court_backs_cheney_on_energy_meetings/">http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/05/11/court_backs_cheney_on_energy_meetings/</a>
<p>/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------/<br>
</p>
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