The Center Sees The Edge

This week it's all about new science that matters. A study funded by a founder of fracking finds the natural gas industry is still bleeding tons of methane into our atmosphere. The top body for American Scientists warns we must act now to prevent climate catastrophe. And an international team confirms the world food supply will be hit hard in a changing climate. Radio Ecoshock 140326

Download/listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

METHANE LEAKING FROM NATURAL GAS SYSTEMS - DR. ADAM BRANDT

Suprise, suprise. A new study finds methane emissions from natural gas systems have been greatly Underestimated. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas. Is gas worth the risk? Is it better than coal?

Let's find out from the lead author of a new study looking at methane escaping from the gas system. Dr. Adam R. Brandt is with the Department of Energy Resources and Engineering at Stanford University.

The latest report on this problem is found in the paper "Methane Leaks from North American Natural Gas Systems". It was published in the February 14th edition of the journal "Science".

Find the paper summary here.

Brandt was part of a big team, with many names I recognize from universities, NOAA, the Lawrence Livermore Lab, even the U.S. Department of State. So we know this isn't going to be an attack piece on fracking or the gas industry. In fact, Adam tells me right off the bat, this study was funded by the foundation established by one of the wealthy pioneers of fracking, the Cynthia and George Mitchell Foundation.

This is part of my continuing coverage of methane emissions from natural gas. What could be more timely after a deadly blast in New York City, and a barrage of ads from the industry saying how green they are. Please notice I take care in the first story to let you know who funded this assessment of the industry, and some of the energy-friendly government labs who took part in it. Even so, they found a lot of leaking methane, and super-emitters in some states.

The study found that previous Environmental Protection Agency figures on methane emissions from gas production and distribution were low by about 50%. But that excess gas, Brandt tell us, isn't necessarily from fracking, but from the gas industry as a whole. For example, natural gas processing and compression plants have been underestimating their emissions.

In past weeks on Radio Ecoshock, we heard how studies of Boston, Los Angeles and Washington D.C. found between 3 and 7% of all gas entering the city leaks out on a daily basis. Some of those leaks are large enough to be explosive, but authorities and industry have been slow to act. No wonder we see some tragedies.

Brandt's study found that a tiny percentage of equipment in the gas industry is leaking most of the methane. If those broken pipes, connections, and valves could be located inexpensively, it wouldn't be too hard to greatly reduce the methane loss. Scientists and industry are working on cheaper locating devices. It's not easy, because there are over 200 million miles of natural gas pipes under the United States alone!

Download/listen to my interview with Dr. Adam Brandt here.

Here are a few links to follow up. A decent summary of this study is here. Stanford's press release is helpful here.

I also liked this article in Technology Review, and check out the further links it contains, to track the problem further.

THE AAAS SCIENTISTS WARN ON CLIMATE CHANGE - DR. JAMES MCCARTHY

Scientists know we are heading over a climate cliff, something not seen in human times on Earth. Why are they not speaking out? They are. The American Association for the Advancement of Science is launching a new report called "What We Know".

To talk about it, I reached Dr. James McCarthy - Alexander Agassiz Professor of Biological Oceanography, at Harvard University.

Find some good articles articles covering the release of this report here, here, and here.

And check out this short and realistic video, and get the report from the AAAS here!

AN UNUSUAL INTERVIEW WITH A WALL STREET RISK MANAGER - BOB LITTERMAN

I seldom interview wall Street players about climate change and industry responsibility. So this release by the triple AAAS was a good chance to do just that.

Bob Litterman is a former partner and risk manager at Goldman Sachs. With other Goldman alumni, he's now with fund manager Kepos Capital. He was a Partner at Goldman Sachs, as the legendary "grandfather" and originator of "Quant" trading!

To open, I ask Bob about the Carbon Tracker report outlining the huge risk that stranded assets of unburnable fossil fuels pose to the world financial system. Litterman was well aware of this, but says that without a price on carbon, or at least an expectation of a price on it, the market was unlikely to change its investment in energy companies.

That is disappointing to me. I had hoped Wall Street executives would notice their kids and grandkids, asking themselves what kind of future they would have. That should be motivation too. Because I don't see the U.S. instituting a price on carbon any time soon. According to Bob, that means no change from financial institutions. Which kinda means we are doomed to excessive climate change, according to the scientists I talk to.

Anyway, I appreciate Bob Litterman talking about climate change, and the importance of this new release from the AAAS. Bob is aware of climate risks, and hopes a solution can be found. Read his interesting article "What Is the Right Price for Carbon Emissions" here.

Almost as an aside in the interview, as a Board Member of the World Wildlife Fund, Litterman explains the WWF has investments in both coal and the Tar Sands. Fearing a possible price on carbon, they didn't sell those investments. Instead, the WWF kinda green-washed the situation by using a derivatives swap to be able to say the income was from a general stock index instead. I'm sure wildlife heading for extinction would understand.

None of us can afford to wait for a price on carbon. Pension funds, universities, non-profits and anyone with a brain needs to get out of fossil fuels right now. They are killing off our future.

Congratulations to the American Association for the Advancement of Science for having the guts to speak against climate change and denial.

CLIMATE THREAT TO WORLD FOOD PRODUCTION - DR. A.J. CHALLINORE

We've all got the sinking feeling. Climate change could mean food shortages in the coming decades. But we don't really know how, or how much. An international team of scientists has plowed through vast numbers of studies, trying to add up what we know. They've published a first look at their findings in the journal Nature Climate Change. the Nature Climate Change letter titled "A meta-analysis of crop yield under climate change and adaptation" was published online on March 16, 2014.

At the the University of Leeds, where he teaches climate impacts, I reached the lead author, Dr. A.J. Challinor.

Food experts, including Lester Brown of Earth Policy Institute, have used the maxim that for every degree of warming, world food production would be reduced by 10 percent. All though this new study doesn't measure things in those terms, Challinore says that figure does that hold up.

I ask how this new paper compares to the previous AR4 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and will it be part of the new Fifth Assessment report coming out this year? Previous IPCC estimates thought food production might be the same, but this new study finds real problems as we go forward into climate change. As Challinore is also an author of the Fifth Assessment due out in a week or two, his work will be included. Radio Ecoshock listeners get an advance preview in this interview!

Download/listen to this interview with Dr. Andy Challinore here, in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

Find articles about this study here and here.

YOU CAN HELP KEEP NON-PROFIT RADIO ALIVE!

That concludes another packed show from Radio Ecoshock. I'm your reporter Alex Smith. Please help this program keep going, with your financial support at our web site, ecoshock.org.

And during the spring fund-raising drive, I ask you to pledge support for your local non-profit radio station. These are not easy times, and we need that platform for the uncomfortable truth to get out there. Here is a list of stations that broadcast Radio Ecoshock.

Thank you so much for listening, and I hope we'll meet again next week.

READY TO SCRAMBLE TO THE POLES?

QUICK SHOW SUMMARY: Author of "American Exodus" Giles Slade sees humans joining plants & animals in migration toward Poles. Paul Beckwith on alarming new Arctic melt science from NASA. Dr. Nathan Phillips on gas leaks in Boston and Washington D.C. Grab it now.

READY TO SCRAMBLE TO THE POLES?

It's hard to imagine. Will you decide to move, to leave your home, because of climate change? Maybe relentless heat becomes too much. Fires could burn you out, of floods come so often there's no money to rebuild. It might be just one too many awful storms. Crops could fail, goosing food price ridiculously high, busting the local economy.

Animals, plants and fish are already moving either toward the Poles, or to higher ground. Humans, for all our technology, may not be exempt. Some of you are already wondering if that's in your future too.

Our first guest says it will happen. That's Giles Slade, author of American Exodus. He's talking about millions of Americans, and Latin Americans, seeking greener pastures, or at least cooler ones, in Canada and Alaska. The Canadians may simply move even further north.

The same future has been predicted by British scientists Sir James Lovelock. He sees the ocean-wrapped British Isles become a destination point for North Africans, and people from Southern Europe, as great deserts form there. Look out Scandinavia and Siberia, for the same reasons.

This may not happen this year, or even this decade, but we'll talk about it.

Then climate scientist Paul Beckwith returns with a startling new NASA study about the Arctic Ice melt. That change is producing about one quarter of all warming. How will that change science and climate activism?

Worried about methane leaks in the Arctic? We wrap up with another new survey of natural gas leaks in major American cities, this time in Boston and Washington D.C. Measurement show our big cities are big methane sources. That's something the "natural" gas salespeople don't tell you, when they promise to be better than coal.

Ready? I'm Alex Smith, and this is Radio Ecoshock.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

AMERICAN EXODUS - GILES SLADE

Maybe after a cold winter, some gritty, sweaty summers sound pretty good. As long as the power stays on, with air-conditioners running.

But then food gets too expensive or runs out. Or you can't get insurance after yet another flood, storm or fire. With no money to rebuild, It's time. It's time to move the family somewhere cooler, with regular rain. It's time to move to New Zealand, to Scandinanvia, or to Canada, if you can.

What if a few million others go the same route? Our next guest Giles Slade thinks it will happen: a massive migration, driven by climate change and a fallen economy. Millions of Americans, and maybe Latin Americans, will move north.

Giles Slade is an award winning author with his works about consumption and planned obsolecence. From his home on the West Coast of Canada, he joins us now, to talk about his book "American Exodus: Climate Change and the Coming Flight for Survival"

Giles is pretty well known for two previous books: "The Big Disconnect – How our long affair with ever-new technologies has undermined interpersonal relationships" and "Made to Break, Technology and Obsolescence in America." That last one captured the International Publisher's Gold Medal (IPPY award) for best Environment/Ecology/Nature book of 2007.

We talk about previous migrations, starting with the "OKies" who fled Oklahoma and surrounding states during the Dust Bowl in the 1930's. Giles' message: don't expect to be welcomed as a climate refugee. The OKies were treated as second class citizens, harassed by local police, and got the worst jobs, if any.

It was a little better for what may be America's first climate refugees, the thousands who fled New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. But there was still a tendency to blame the victims. Plus, there was a reasonably functioning society around them.

You know it's been a rough road for the millions of Mexicans and Latin Americans arriving in the U.S., legally and illegally.

We discuss a Canadian preoccupation: if the weather gets too bad or too hot, will millions of Americans cross the border into Canada? Strangely, the American military has looked at possibilities, but the Canadian government has it's head buried firmly in their .... climate denial.

James Lovelock, picturing Britain as an island somewhat cooled by surrounding seas, proposed the government get a start now, building schools and hospitals to serve the millions of climate refugees coming. Indeed, there are more people from the dry, hot Middle East and Mediterranean moving to the United Kingdom. Should Canada prepare as well? Is any preparation possible?

A lot of Americans are very patriotic. They love the place where they live. It would be heart-breaking to leave. It's going to take a lot to make them move to another country. People will only leave their homes when they have no other choice.

I think the rich will move first, perhaps establishing a base to run to, with lots of preparation. Poorer people will just set out on the roads driving or even walking north. That could end up with like Cormac McCarthy's book "The Road".

Download/listen to this 25 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Giles Slade in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

Keep track of Giles Slade at his web site.

ARCTIC ICE MELT WARMS WORLD BY ANOTHER 25% - PAUL BECKWITH

When there's big news about the Arctic Sea ice, and there is - who else to call but Paul Beckwith. He's the double-Masters man, working on his Doctorate in climatology at the University of Ottawa. Paul has been watching the Arctic ice closely for years.

A newly released study by NASA, the National Atmospheric and Space Administration, has calculated the difference in reflection of the Sun's rays, due to less sea ice in the Arctic during summer. It doesn't sound like a big change, being about 4% more heat absorbed now, compared to 1979. But NASA says that is huge, accounting for 25% as much global warming as all our human-made fossil fuel burning put together.

The Journal reference for this new study is: PNAS, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1318201111

Until this study, we had no idea. That means there is now a force for warming well beyond human control. It's not our tailpipes or our factories, but simple loss of sea ice (which melted due to our tailpipes and our factories over the past few decades). This is just the loss of bright reflective surface, and does not include the extra heat pumped into the darker ocean below. It's big, big news, and Paul Beckwith is just the man to bring it into perspective.

Listen to this 18 minute Radio Ecoshock interview, or download it, in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

As a member of the Arctic Methane Emergency Group, which includes Arctic ice specialist Peter Wadhams at Cambridge - Paul has been ringing the alarm bells about the importance of dwindling ice cover on the Arctic Ocean.

The group thinks we should enact emergency geo-engineering to halt the ice loss, or maybe even restore it somewhat. They would do that by spraying sulphate particles to reflect the sun, as the ice did before. The sulphates would just be sprayed in the Arctic. In a previous interview, Paul said the particles would stay in the Arctic for a long time, due to prevailing wind patterns, but would eventually mix across the whole planet.

It's risky, but this latest NASA study does add weight to the AMEG position. I'm not ready to advocate that yet, but I'm wavering.

I think this new study will also change climate science, and maybe climate activism. Climate scientists, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has been busy calculating so much change for so many barrels of oil, or tons of coal burned. Now we find out there's a huge feedback from the emerging dark surface of the Arctic Sea. Will some climate activists need to bring more focus on what is happening in the Arctic?

We also talk a little about the Polar Vortex, the relationship between melting Arctic sea ice and the rotten winter in North America and the UK. It's a wide-ranging interview.

Follow the prolific Paul Beckwith at his Facebook page here. And don't miss his regular You tube videos.

THE NEW AMERICAN METHANE THREAT - NATHAN PHILLIPS

In past shows, going back a year or two, I've covered the many ways methane leaks out of the supply chain, before it gets burned in your stove or furnace as natural gas. My ground-breaking interview with Robert Howarth of Cornell is still important, along with his speech recorded at ASPO 2011. That's all in this Radio Ecoshock show on fracking from 2011.

The natural gas industry, mainly the frackers, keep telling us on TV, newspapers and online how their clean fuel is so much better than coal. They don't tell you their fracked wells blast methane into the sky, leak methane from storage, and leak still more methane all along bad pipelines and worse city distribution systems.

Last year a team of scientists drove a truck-full of measuring equipment around Boston and found literally thousands of natural gas leaks. Now the same team has released a new study showing thousands more leaks in Washington D.C.

Some of those leaks were so serious they posed a hazard for explosion. The scientists reported a dozen or so of the worst, and checking back 4 months later, found at least 4 had not been fixed! There is a whole You tube genre of videos with nothing but huge gas explosions. We just had a major line blow in Kentucky. According to press reports, more than a dozen people are killed every year in gas explosions, and the damages can be huge, over $100 million dollars.

But the real danger is simple: "natural gas" is methane. Methane is at least 100 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas during the first dozen years or so in the atmosphere. After that it begins to degrade into carbon dioxide and other substances, so the 100 year outlook for methane is perhaps 25 or 30 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. It's the short-term (10 year) risk that is most important for us. Adding the new methane that is fast becoming America's fuel of choice for heating and industrial use, to the new methane coming from the Arctic in places like Eastern Siberia - we could see a sudden up-tick in warming from methane alone.

The natural gas companies are using antiquated pipe systems to deliver in the cities. In the East, those systems are up to 100 years old.

We are joined by one of the principals in these studies, Dr. Nathan Phillips, a professor at Boston University. Dr. Phillips goes over the nature of the study, the risks to trees and human health, and the climate change risks.

Download or listen to this 20 minute interview with Nathan Phillips in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

I didn't know trees were endangered by natural gas leaks, but apparently their roots need oxygen just as our lungs do. "Natural" gas also helps more smog form, posing a human health risk.

The gas companies know how much they have been losing. They can just calculate the amount coming into a major metropolitan market, versus the actual amounts they bill for. Now those figures are publicly available in the U.S. but the public hasn't shown much interest yet.

There are similar problems, or worse, in the older cities of Britain and Continental Europe, where natural gas really got started lighting cities. Some European experts are getting in touch with the team of Nathan Phillips and his co-author Rob Jackson, formerly of Duke University, but now at Stanford.

Eastern cities like Boston have taken a winter pounding this year. Americans are burning more natural gas this winter, and that means even more is leaking out directly into the atmosphere, although it varies from city to city.

Nathan Phillips is co-author of the papers "Mapping urban pipeline leaks: Methane leaks across Boston" and "Natural Gas Pipeline Leaks Across Washington, D.C.," That one was just published in the January 16th edition of the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

There has been another national study into gas leaks in the United States, with a measurement of the climate change potential. I'm going to interview that scientist as well. We can't let this story go, even though mainstream media is giving it the big yawn. Aside from the people and property blown up every year, the line that natural gas is a good bridge while we get off coal is a lie. Joe Romm at the Climate Progress blog calls Natural Gas "the bridge to nowhere".

Maybe if I keep yammering about this science, and you pass it on, some other reporters will start covering the leaky and dangerous natural gas game.

NEXT WEEK

Next week I'll have a special for you on the great California drought. Is it climate change? Will food prices go up in North America, or the whole world?

Readership in this blog has really picked up in recent months. We had over 8,000 reads last week, and more than a thousand extra downloads from those readers. Please pass the word on to others.

My special thanks to all the listeners who support this show, and their non-profit community radio stations.

Find out more at the web site, ecoshock.org. Your support makes my reporting and broadcast possible.

I'm Alex. Thanks for listening again this week.

Where Are We Really? Radio Ecoshock returns.

Analysis of climate situation by Paul Beckwith, U of Ottawa. Plus Arnie Gundersen updates Fukushima leaks and radioactive plume in the Pacific, heading for the U.S. Radio Ecoshock 130911 1 hour.

WELCOME BACK!

Welcome back to the Fall 2013 season of Radio Ecoshock, broadcast on more than 70 college and community stations around the world.

This is Alex Smith. Big news continues to pour in from around the world. We've got a lineup of guests, experts and activists, waiting to make sense of it all.

As I left for a break in July, I issued a special podcast on the global heat wave. If you missed that, join the thousands who download it from our web site at ecoshock.org. At the time of broadcast, the heat wasn't quite complete around the Northern Hemisphere. The Russian Arctic seemed still coolish, and no word from China, although Japan was suffering through record heat.

One week later, Siberia went into an extended heat alert with hundreds of fires. South East China went down to a killer heat wave, setting the highest coastal temperature records ever seen on the Pacific Coast of Asia.

So the circle went complete. I'm not sure if this is absolutely new, but in 25 years of reporting climate news, I can't remember a super hemispheric heat wave like this. We can't call it a global heat wave, because of course it's winter in the southern hemisphere. But we can call it global warming, and 2013 is the year when we entered into a certain phase of climate change.

It's still cooking, with the hottest days of summer in Toronto Canada striking in mid-September (beach time!) and more records expected in Vancouver. Strange... what could it be? I'll have lots more on all that later in the program, as we do a climate run-down with Paul Beckwith, a postgrad climate scientist at the University of Ottawa. Paul is a favorite climate correspondent, really linked in to the latest in both extreme weather events and the latest science behind them.

Download this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

FUKUSHIMA'S TANK FARMS - LURKING DEATH FOR THE PACIFIC OCEAN

No doubt you've heard more about the continuing nuclear disaster at Fukushima Japan. Three reactors melted down in March 2011. A fourth had a fire and explosion in the fuel storage area. Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, has been struggling to contain radiation leaks ever since. Is Japan safe? Is the Pacific being polluted with radiation? What about the whole Northern Hemisphere?

I'm Alex Smith. Radio Ecoshock welcomes back nuclear expert and whistle-blower Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Associates.

Arnie Gundersen

Here is a brief wrap up on what I think is the world's worst nuclear disaster. Three reactor cores have escaped out of the containment. Nobody knows where this glowing hot stuff is.

Thousands of tons of groundwater are passing through the highly radioactive melted "corium" every day. Some of that is being captured by TEPCO and put into an endlessly growing tank farm. The rest is leaking into the Pacific Ocean.

In August TEPCO admitted it was missing 300 tons of highly radioactive water from one of it's tanks. You see, they only had two men checking all those tanks, which are hastily built (and not ready for any earthquake). The people checking the tanks did not even wear a dosimiter, so there is no way of knowing how much radiation they were exposed to.

Now with the leak exposed, TEPCO has promised more inspectors. It's a joke. This Japanese utility, as Arnie Gundersen tells us, is a nuclear plant operator (and not a very good one) - not a world-class engineering firm. Plus, they have gone more or less bankrupt, and don't have the budget to handle this situation.

Finally, after a lot more press and international concern, the Japanese government is going to add more fund, but not much more, because they are broke too.

If these tanks rupture in a big way, or if the fuel rod storage ponds suspended in the damaged building Four at Fukushima Daiichi collapse, the whole Northern Hemisphere will be bathed in radiation. Surely this is an international issue which requires a huge response. But both our media and our governments are downplaying the risk.

What a joke that Tokyo, which was bathed in radiation that will last at least 50 years (during the March 2011 accident) was awarded the Olympics! Tokyo, the city that shines at night! If there is a major leak at Fukushima, Tokyo will be evacuated by 2020 anyway. Even during the 2011 accident, the government considered evacuating the city.

In a previous Radio Ecoshock interview, Gundersen said the Japanese should start unloading nuclear fuel bundles from Reactor 4, before that building collapses. TEPCO has been building a stronger outside structure to hold the heavy cranes, after the original cranes collapsed.

Arnie is a nuclear fuel rod expert. He worked as a nuclear engineer and executive in exactly that field. Gundersen warns the fuel rods have likely been damaged during the accident. One or several may break during attempted extraction, releasing highly radioactive gases. The whole site would have to be evacuated for a time. Expect more air-borne radiation releases, for Japan, and for the whole hemisphere.

I asked Arnie when the plume of radioactive water that has been leaking into the Pacific non-stop since the accident two and half years ago - will reach the west coast of the United States and Canada. Maps of ocean currents show the worst radiation will hit California and the Baja Peninsula. Arnie thinks it should arrive sometime in late 2014 - and he says that radiation in the ocean is 10 times more than we got from all the atomic bomb testing. Sure it will be diluted in the Pacific, but a whole ocean has been poisoned.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/01/fukushima-radioactive-plume_n_3853604.html Meanwhile, all the fish that bioconcentrate radioactivity, predator fish like salmon and tuna, are feeding out there in the Pacific. Do you think we can get either the American or Canadian governments to test our fish for radioactivity? Canada promises it won't do testing. If the U.S. is testing, they are not releasing the data. Consumers don't know what they are getting. It's time for a little transparency, and governments that protect their people rather than the nuclear or fishing industries.

BETTER NUCLEAR NEWS IN THE UNITED STATES

Arnie Gundersen has repeatedly been an expert witness in the effort to get the dangerous and aging Vermont Yankee reactor closed. It's located on the sea, 5 miles south of Brattleboro in New England, and owned by Entergy Corp.

Just like Fukushima, the Vermont Yankee plant is an old-style General Electric boiling water reactor. Under the thick concrete pipes are leaking. It's damn dangerous.

Finally, Entergy has announced that in 2014, when the current batch of nuclear fuel would have to be replaced, the Vermont Yankee reactor will shut down instead. That's great news for New England and the planet.

The sad news is Entergy wants to wait 60 years to decommission the plant! So this radioactive mess will sit there for another generation. Our grandchildren will pay huge costs for the power we used today. That's an inter-generational crime.

AND THEN THERE'S THAT LITTLE CLIMATE PROBLEM...

Climate change has certainly shown up on planet Earth in a big way these past few months. Records are falling so fast, with so many new changes, its beyond our ability to track it all. Let's do a recap of some big climate news with one of our popular guests, Paul Beckwith.

Paul is a PHD graduate student in the Laboratory for Paleoclimatology and Climatology, and part-time Professor, at the University of Ottawa in Canada. He has a Masters in Physics as well.

We start with Paul's prediction that the Arctic sea ice could break up this year, if there was a significant Arctic storm as well. That didn't happen. Although the ice retreated to levels that would have been astounding a decade ago, it didn't meet last year's record.

Paul says the climate is zig-zagging back and forth unpredictably. Last year temperatures over the Arctic Ocean were quite high, while land temperatures up north were cooler. This year was the opposite. It was coolish over the ice itself, while land temperatures in Alaska, Canada's north and Siberia hit new records in some places.

Science, Beckwith says, will have to be flexible, learning from the instability.

Methane was quite high over the Arctic again this year, more than double the pre-industrial levels. There was no mega-burst (yet). Most of the methane came from melting of permafrost on land where snow cover was lost very early in the season.

We talk about the grossly under-reported floods in the Russian far east, especially along the Amur River. These were floods not seen before. President Putin flew out to speed up some action to help the many evacuees. The worst hit area was in the republic Buryatia, located in the south-central Siberia along the shore of Lake Baikal and on the border with Mongolia.

At the same time, there were hundreds of forest fires ranging in Siberia.

Of course, most of us are only interested in our local area. Fires in Yosemite California get lots of coverage. Fire and floods in Russia? Not so much. Paul points out that's a huge problem when we are trying to deal with global climate change. People push their local politicians for action (or maybe they will eventually) but only if they get hit themselves.

There's lots more to this interview with Paul Beckwith, as we cover some of the extreme weather events this past summer, and in fact this past week. Nobody can keep up with it all. That alone is further evidence that climate change has arrived.

Beckwith is breaking the mold of the climate scientist who keeps quiet for years, and then releases a paper with results. He's more like the communicator the late Stephen Schneider suggested in his book "Science As a Contact Sport". We can't wait 6 years for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to publish out-of-date results says Beckwith.

One of the best ways to keep up with Paul is through his Facebook page. He also blogs for Arctic News, Sierra Club Canada and others.

I agree. I'd like to see buildings full of full-time scientists on every continent charged with the duty of tracking climate change, today, and in the distant past. This is a planetary emergency, and so far we have a tiny budget, volunteer scientists, and governments who are out promoting fossil fuels as the next big job wave! It's like planned extinction.

On the other side, millions and millions of people know the climate is not right. They are waking up. Will a demand for change come in time?

THANK YOU TO ALL ECOSHOCK SUPPORTERS - AND PREPARE FOR CHANGE

Many thanks to all the people who donated or signed up for our monthly Radio Ecoshock membership at our web site, ecoshock.org. I haven't had time to thank you all personally.

This past month has been almost constant turmoil for me. Aside from vehicle breakdowns, we are renovating and preparing to move out of Vancouver, to a rural village. More about that in coming shows.

One week ago, the main hard drive on my production computer died. I'm working on the fly from an ancient box out of our basement. Without the help of Radio Ecoshock listeners I'm not sure we could afford the repairs.

The refurbished audio computer should be back online in a week or so. My next show may be right out of a moving van.

These changes in my personal life seem to echo from the big changes happening on the planet, and in our society. I tell myself we are all going to need fall-back plans, preparation, and an ability to adapt or move, perhaps on short notice.

Our parents and grandparents went through two world wars and a great depression. If my reading of the climate, energy, and economic scene is correct, they had it easy. Expect to enjoy life, sure, but expect to struggle as well.

I'm Alex Smith. Thank you for joining me in this new season of Radio Ecoshock.

Our music clips this week came from the marvelous Suvarna, plus "Till the Day Is Done" by REM.

Private Spies: WikiLeaks Outs Stratfor

Today on Radio Ecoshock you will hear about the brave new world of privatization of intelligence services, global corruption, and abuse of media services for propaganda, big corporations, and private gain. This whole program lets you hear what mainstream media fails to deliver. You will hear critical excerpts from a media press conference in London, February 27th, 2012.

We begin with Julian Assange, the Editor in Chief at WikiLeaks, announcing the first batch from a treasure trove of 5 million emails, hacked from the private intelligence agency Stratfor (Strategic Forecasting, Inc.)

Stratfor is based in Texas. It hires senior U.S. intelligence agents, and draws up plans for the American Air Force and Marines. Stratfor publishes a newsletter costing thousands of dollars, with 300,000 subscribers, many of them in governments around the world.

SPYING FOR CORPORATIONS - AGAINST NGO's

According to the emails, the company also holds private consultations, and undertakes spying operations, even subversion, of public interest and political groups, on behalf of major corporations.

Stratfor was hired by the Coca Cola Company to investigate PETA, People for the Investigation of Animals, in Canada. The soft drinks company was a major sponsor for the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, and feared actions against Canada's seal hunt.

As a measure of the compromise of government secrets available to private intelligence companies, Stratfor emails suggest the company would use full access to FBI files on PETA, who have been labeled "terrorists" for the convenience of the massive American pharmaceutical industry.

The company brags about its possession of top secret classified American documents, including information on drone strikes, and materials from Osama Bin Laden's safe house.

We await the investigation and prosecution of Stratfor for these breaches of American law.

THE CHASE TO "GET" JULIAN ASSANGE

Instead, the emails show a close collusion between several government agencies and Stratfor, in a campaign to capture and jail Julian Assange of WikiLeaks.

Stratfor’s Vice-President for Counterterrorism and Corporate Security, Fred Burton, is a former Deputy Chief of the Department of State’s counterterrorism division for the Diplomatic Security Service. WikiLeaks has found a secret email from early 2011 from Burton, saying a sealed indictment against Julian Assange has already been issued by a secret Grand Jury in the United States. In expletive laced emails, Burton plots with others to bankrupt Assange, to have his Australian citizenship revoked, to have Assange extradited to the U.S. for a lengthy prison term, if not for life.

Julian Assange has been held in Britain for more than a year, waiting on a case for extradition to Sweden, on sex charges which even Stratfor employees, according to the released emails, do not believe.

HOW THE HACKED DOCUMENTS ARE BEING PROCESSED

The hackers group Anonymous hacked into the 5 million emails of Stratfor, where security was ridiculously lax. They delivered the whole batch to WikiLeaks, who organized a team of more than 25 world media outlets to analyze the mountains of information. The press conference featured journalists from the U.S., Britain, Italy, Spain, and Lebanon. Also presenting were the media activist group "The Yes Men" and UK charities representing victims of the 1984 Bhopal pesticide horror - all spied on by Stratfor on behalf of the Dow Chemical company, current owners of the still poisonous Bhopal site in India.

You need to understand how corporations and big governments team up against their own citizens, to preserve the rights and profits of the 1 percent.

Before we hear the other activists and journalists, let's get back to the opening remarks by Julian Assange of WikiLeaks speaking at the WikiLeaks press conference titled "The Global Intelligence Files" in London, February 27th. This is Radio Ecoshock.

Leaks of emails from the private intelligence company Stratfor reveal the company spies on activist groups and non-profits, even charities helping medical treatment for victims of corporate accidents.

THE YES MEN

The Yes Men kicked it off by announcing, on BBC, that Dow Chemical company had finally taken responsibility for helping the victims of the Bhopal disaster, and cleaning up the site.

The world has longed to hear that Dow has done the right thing. Unfortunately, the BBC was taken in yet again by The Yes Men, the media activist group. Stratfor was called in to investigate.

From the WikiLeaks press conference, we hear Mike Bonanno of the media activists "The Yes Men" at theyesmen.org. You are listening to Radio Ecoshock highlights, lightly edited for radio, from the WikiLeaks press conference in London, February 27th. Many corporate and government relationships became clear that day.

IS STRATFOR REALLY JUST A MEDIA ORGANIZATION?

Stratfor claims publicly to be a media group, although you and I never read their publications, unless we can pay thousands of dollars for their newsletter. Inside their own emails however, the top executives make clear their roots as a private spy agency vying for global supremacy.

The difference between a real media outlet, and Stratfor, is explains in a short clip from Stephania, from the Italian news magazine L'espresso.

We find more from Carlos Enrique Bayo of the former Spanish newspaper Publico, now published as web-only.

THREE SPEAKERS FOR BHOPAL VICTIMS (spied on by Stratfor)

Then we listen to three activists helping victims of the 1984 and on-going Bhopal chemical disaster in India, as introduced by Mike Bonanno of the Yes Men.

* Colin Toogood from the UK charity "Bhopal Medical Appeal",

* Bhopal survivor Farah Edwards Khan, (her statement on You tube here)and

* UK-based Indra Sinha, author of the Bhopal-based novel "Animal's People."

NATIONAL SECURITY FOR WHO?

A reporter asks, are these emails from the private intelligence company Stratfor a danger to national security. In his response, WikiLeaks Editor in Chief Julian Assange gives us all a quick lesson on what the words "national security" have come to mean: "security" for the 1 percent who struggle to maintain their dominance over the rest of society.

We get more classic analysis from Julian Assange, the man Attorney General Eric Holder, the Pentagon, and the CEO of Stratfor hope to jail for life, for his revelations of American emails on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

THE GOLDMAN SACHS CONNECTION

One plot coming out of the emails, was the arrival at Stratfor of Shea Morenz, who was in 2009 (and perhaps after) a Director at Wall Street firm Goldman Sachs. Morenz and Stratfor CEO George Friedman hatched a plan to spin off the intelligence gathered into an investing company to be called "Stratcap".

The leaked emails indicate Morenz injected around two million dollars into Stratfor, and invested at least four million more into the new investment company. "Stratcap" was to be sold as an independent company - to draw investors - but the internal emails indicated Friedman told his staff Stratcap would be an integral part of Stratfor.

So what? It looks like a plan to intentionally mislead potential investors. And Stratfor would use information which is apparently gathered from its clients, including U.S. Government agencies (read the taxpayer) to make investments for profits. "Stratcap" was to be released in 2012, but that is now in doubt after these emails surfaced.

We also see how a Goldman Sachs employee, or former employee, and Wall Street generally, uses insider information for trading, information not available to the public and other investors.

MUCH MORE TO COME

WikiLeaks just released the first batch of 5 million emails hacked from one of the world's largest private intelligence companies, Stratfor. Expect more revelations in the coming months. Check the live blog at firedoglake by Kevin Gosztola, and of course the WikiLeaks pages (notice the articles on the right hand side of this page, especially the article "Stratfor on the Australian Assange".

SPYING ON THE OCCUPY MOVEMENT

During the recorded Question and Answers with the press, Julian Assange compares the way Rupert Murdoch's News of the World handled its spy and bribery scandal (at least they answered questions) to Stratfor's outright denial to explain their behavior.

One of the media partners in the WikiLeaks release is Rolling Stone magazine. Their reporter Michael Hastings found emails and other evidence that the Department of Homeland Security has been monitoring the Occupy Movement. Apparently the DHS wants a report on the impact of Occupy on the financial services sector.

Wait a minute; wasn't the Department of Homeland Security set up to protect all citizens against terrorist attacks? And now it has become yet another domestic spy agency on behalf of the banks and Wall Street?

Watch what you Tweet, because Big Brother, and his dog Stratfor, are spying on you. Michael Hastings reports DHS was following all social media, including Facebook, which no doubts co-operates. Just more fodder for the giant database in the sky of ordinary taxpayers who object to paying off bad debts from banking industry gambling.

THE INCOMPETENCE OF STRATFOR

Like some journalists in this press conference, some critics find Stratfor's analysis to be misinformed or even a "joke".

In an article called "McStrategy" by David P. Goldman - Stratfor CEO George Friedman's strange predictions are revealed. Friedman says Poland, of all places, will be the new powerhouse of Europe, while an alliance of Turkey and Japan will face-off with the United States. It's all in his book, available as a bonus when you sign up for a newsletter subscription!

Max Fisher, writing in The Atlantic, simply says "Stratfor Is a Joke and So Is WikiLeaks for Taking It Seriously". Well, their analysts may be incompetent, but politicians believe it, and the U.S. Marines let Stratfor do their long-range planning.

As Assange said in our recording: "These organizations because of their secrecy, corruption flourishes within them, but the other thing, and in fact it is the one thing that has really saved the world, is that incompetence also flourishes in the dark."

We wrap up the radio program with a short summary of what Stratfor is, by Julian Assange. There are really three income streams, in a multi-layered organization.

WHO GETS "NEWS" AND WHO GETS "INTELLIGENCE"

Assange raised a critical question for all of us who read "the news". As international agencies like Reuters began to lose revenues to free distribution on the Net, and their newspaper clients also suffered loses, many are tempted by, or take over by, a profitable business selling information first, or exclusively, to wealthy corporations and governments.

In fact, Reuters merged with the Thompson data empire, which also sells private reports to governments and major corporations. Did that merger taint Reuters as well, Assange asks?

(It's classic Assange analysis, not published anywhere else, as far as I know. Make sure you listen.)

We come to ask: how much of what is known is published?

Are we, the public, always the last to know, and the least informed?

Why do so many public agencies pay so much money, to get information produced at the taxpayer's expense, and supposedly protected by law?

When will those who corrupt government officials, journalists, and insiders - freely taking classified information to sell to the highest bidder - be investigated and charged?

Will the American Congress investigate Stratfor, and establish rules to govern private intelligence agencies - before they govern us?

I'm Alex Smith. Find "The Global Intelligence Files" and support the freedom of Julian Assange, at the web site wikileaks.org.

Thank you for listening.