Industry should not exploit COVID-19 to push more plastic pollution - Greenpeace USA
https://www.greenpeace.org/...s/industry-should-not-exploit-covid-19-to-push-more-plastic-pollution/

As COVID-19 continues to spread, surrogates of plastics and petrochemical manufacturers have promoted fear of reusable bags in order to help industry sell more plastic. These groups, including the Manhattan Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, are financed by petrochemical refinery companies. They have misrepresented studies that show coronavirus may persist on plastic surfaces longer than other materials.

These front groups are echoing plastic company consultants and industry-funded researchers, whose studies are being re-circulated to suggest that reusable bags risk transmitting disease. This misinformation is already being used to lobby state legislatures to defeat or repeal plastic bag ban legislation and risks further confusion amidst a public health crisis.

In response, Greenpeace USA Oceans Campaign Director John Hocevar said:

“Industry groups have seen this crisis as an opportunity to exploit people’s fears around COVID-19 to push their pro-pollution agendas. Even in the short term, plastic does not inherently make something clean and safe, and we should not confuse corporate public relations with factual medical research. A new study from National Institutes of Health, CDC, UCLA, and Princeton University scientists in The New England Journal of Medicine has indicated that the virus could be stable on plastic surfaces for as long as two to three days

While you were distracted by the growing pandemic, three states passed laws criminalizing fossil fuel protests, handing the industry big victories. https://t.co/O6OrCWUGlr


States Quietly Pass Laws Criminalizing Fossil Fuel Protests Amid Coronavirus Chaos
https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5e7e7570c5b6256a7a2aab41/

Over the past two weeks, Kentucky, South Dakota and West Virginia approved new laws meant to discourage Dakota Access-style protests. More are on the way.

...

as experts blamed the White House’s back-footed response for inflaming the crisis, the Trump administration appeared to ramp up its environmental agenda, ordering the Environmental Protection Agency’s enforcement division to temporarily stop policing polluters, approving a slate of mining projects, auctioning off new drilling leases and reviving a dormant fight over auto emission standards.

Europe under quarantine, mostly very clean air, except Poland. Strange. https://t.co/1ODwAmy5PT

(& the rest of V4/R4)

Only 3 months have observed a mean global temperature anomaly >1.20°C above the 1951-1980 climate baseline (GISTEMPv4 data)

1. February 2016
2. March 2016
3. *February 2020*

*Note: M = sunspot cycle max, m = sunspot cycle min, V = volcano

[Graphic by https://t.co/ZTndADSk5W] https://t.co/AopaY9zjoY

Increasingly mobile sea ice risks polluting Arctic neighbors | CU Boulder Today | University of Colorado Boulder
https://www.colorado.edu/.../2020/03/18/increasingly-mobile-sea-ice-risks-polluting-arctic-neighbors

The movement of sea ice between Arctic countries is expected to significantly increase this century, raising the risk of more widely transporting pollutants like microplastics and oil, according to new research from CU Boulder.

The study in the American Geophysical Union journal Earth’s Future predicts that by mid-century, the average time it takes for sea ice to travel from one region to another will decrease by more than half, and the amount of sea ice exchanged between Arctic countries such as Russia, Norway, Canada and the United States will more than triple.

Increased interest in off-shore Arctic development, as well as shipping through the Central Arctic Ocean, may increase the amount of pollutants present in Arctic waters. And contaminants in frozen ice can travel much farther than those in open water moved by ocean currents.

“This means there is an increased potential for sea ice to quickly transport all kinds of materials with it, from algae to oil,” said Patricia DeRepentigny, doctoral candidate in the Department for Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. “That's important to consider when putting together international laws to regulate what happens in the Arctic.”

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019EF001284

TADEAS: sorry, korekce:

Tonight's update now shows 2020 as the absolute lowest on record for the date (3/28/2020) https://t.co/5sD94o9fVt

TADEAS: loni jsme řešili že nikdo nebude chtít makat rukama na poli, teď se to ukáže

#Arctic sea ice extent is currently the 4th lowest on record (JAXA data).

• about 310,000 km² less the 2010s mean
• about 760,000 km² less the 2000s mean
• about 1,250,000 km² less the 1990s mean
• about 1,660,000 km² less the 1980s mean

More plots: https://t.co/FUU9OT6IeN

With the climate crisis and coronavirus bearing down on us, the age of disconnection is over | Coronavirus outbreak | The Guardian
https://amp.theguardian.com/...s-and-coronavirus-bearing-down-on-us-the-age-of-disconnection-is-over

The true legacy of this summer could be a vital turning point in recognising that “the environment” isn’t something “over there”. The environment is the air we breathe and the water we drink; it’s the soil in which we grow our food; it’s the animals we identify with and the landscapes imprinted on our souls; the environment is us, all of us, together, integrally connected with everyone and everything else on this beautiful blue marble floating in space.

Damage the environment and we damage ourselves. And not just some of us – all of us together. Continue to think in our compartmentalised, linear fashion, and we’ll keep missing what’s coming, be it weeks of smoke, runs on toilet paper, or deadly pandemics.

What started to become clear thanks to the fires was rammed home by Covid-19. We are only as healthy as the least healthy among us. Everything we do relies on extraordinary networks of activity by people we’ve never met, crisscrossing the globe. And responding to a health crisis that was likely triggered in part by environmental destruction has world-changing impacts on the economy, on education, on social justice, on geopolitics.

The age of disconnection is over.

TADEAS: a v cz

Výpadek zahraničních pracovníků v zemědělství zatím pokryli hlavně lidé z průmyslu. Hlásí se ale i herci a důchodci | Hospodářské noviny (iHNed.cz)
https://archiv.ihned.cz/...delstvi-zatim-pokryli-hlavne-lide-z-prumyslu-hlasi-ale-i-herci-a-duchodci

XRTV Interview: Chris Hedges on Coronavirus, Climate and What Next?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FfkKkmCSu4

Fruit and veg ‘will run out’ unless Britain charters planes to fly in farm workers from eastern Europe | Environment | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/...ss-britain-charters-planes-to-fly-in-farm-workers-from-eastern-europe

Because of the tightening of labour, we had already lost a percentage of farms,” Maurel said. “This will finish others off. You won’t have fruit and veg in shops. Asparagus and beans start in a couple of weeks, cucumbers early April, tomatoes are all year round; in May it’s soft fruits – strawberries, raspberries; lettuces have been in the ground since December.”

Nick Marston, the chairman of British Summer Fruits, which represents soft fruit growers, acknowledged that his industry was “entering an unprecedented time”.

Last year, 98% of fruit pickers – now classed as “key workers” – came from outside the UK, the vast majority from Bulgaria and Romania.

nie je to moc ale aspon cosi

COVID-19 impact on Asian emissions: Insight from space observations | Atmospheric Chemistry Observations & Modeling (ACOM)
https://www2.acom.ucar.edu/news/covid-19-impact-asian-emissions-insight-space-observations

El sector nuclear afronta un escenario inédito de cierres si se prolonga la crisis
https://www.lainformacion.com/empresas/sector-nuclear-escenario-inedito-cierres/6554396/

The power companies that own the Almaraz (Cáceres) and Ascó (Tarragona) nuclear power plants - Iberdrola, Endesa and Naturgy - have had to delay the planned refueling tasks because they require a lot of movement of personnel and the transfer of technicians. The delay, if it extends beyond the scheduled dates - April 14 in Almaraz and April 28 in Ascó - will force the power of the facilities to be reduced. But if the crisis were to continue even further, it would also affect the planned inspections, which opens a scenario of possible reactor blackout. Never seen before.

Basalts Turn Carbon into Stone for Permanent Storage
Scientists have shown that mineral carbonation can permanently capture and store carbon quickly enough and safely enough to rise to the challenge of climate change.

Basalts Turn Carbon into Stone for Permanent Storage - Eos
https://eos.org/articles/basalts-turn-carbon-into-stone-for-permanent-storage

Under extreme heat and drought, trees hardly benefit from an increased CO2 level -- ScienceDaily
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200326124149.htm

Their roots have difficulties reaching the water. To reduce evaporation losses, trees close the stomata of their leaves, as a result of which they take up less CO2 from the air.