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Coal exports help US clean up global warming pollution at home — but still pollute elsewhere
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (AP) — As the Obama administration weans the U.S. off dirty fuels blamed for global warming, energy companies have been sending more of America's unwanted energy leftovers to other parts of the world where they could create even more pollution.
This fossil fuel trade threatens to undermine President Barack Obama's strategy for reducing the gases blamed for climate change and reveals a little-discussed side effect of countries acting alone on a global problem. The contribution of this exported pollution to global warming is not something the administration wants to measure, or even talk about.
"This is the single biggest flaw in U.S. climate policy," said Roger Martella, the former general counsel at the Environmental Protection Agency under President George W. Bush. "Although the administration is moving forward with climate change regulations at home, we don't consider how policy decisions in the United States impact greenhouse gas emissions in other parts of the world."
Over the past six years, American energy companies have sent more coal than ever before to other parts of the world, in some cases to places with more lax environmental standards.
The consequence: This global shell game makes the U.S. appear to be making more progress than it is on global warming. That's because it shifts some pollution — and the burden for cleaning it up — onto other countries' balance sheets.
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5 things to know about how US coal exports shift global warming problem onto other countries
As the Obama administration weans the U.S. off polluting fuels blamed for global warming, energy companies have been sending more of America's unwanted energy leftovers to other parts of the world where they could create even more pollution. Here are five things to know about the issue:
1. AS U.S. REDUCES COAL USE, DEMAND RISES GLOBALLY. Over the past six years, the U.S. has cut consumption by 195 million tons as power plants have burned cheaper natural gas instead. The Environmental Protection Agency's latest proposal would further cut coal's share of electricity generation. Meanwhile, coal demand is rising globally. In 2013, according to the 2014 BP Statistical Review of World Energy, it grew by 3 percent. The International Energy Agency expects global coal demand to grow 2.3 percent per year through 2018.
2. U.S. COAL EXPORTS HAVE SOARED TO MEET RISING DEMAND. The U.S. exported more coal in 2012 and 2013 than any other year since 1949. Exports surpassed 100 million tons for the first time in more than 20 years in 2011. Exports are down this year because of higher natural gas prices and a colder-than-average winter at home. But the U.S. Energy Information Administration predicts coal exports to grow to 161 million tons by 2040 without policy changes. In 2012, the U.S. comprised 9 percent of the global coal export market, the latest data available.
3. COUNTRIES ONLY ACCOUNT FOR POLLUTION FROM COAL THEY BURN. When measuring progress on global warming, countries count only pollution from burning fossil fuels. Coal exports make the U.S. appear to be making more progress on global warming than it actually is, although it's still coming out ahead. Analyses suggest U.S. exports could be reducing by half or wiping out completely the pollution savings in the U.S. from switching power plants from coal to natural gas.
4. OBAMA ADMINISTRATION WON'T DISCLOSE GLOBAL TOLL OF EXPORTS. Three terminals proposed for the Pacific Northwest would double U.S. coal exports. Despite pleas from the governors of Washington and Oregon, the Obama administration has so far refused to evaluate the global impact of those additional exports. A 2010 White House guidance aimed at clarifying how broadly agencies should evaluate greenhouse gas emissions for major projects is still being reviewed.
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Israel carries out 3 airstrikes on Gaza, breaking relative lull at start of Muslim holiday
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli jets pounded three Hamas sites in Gaza on Monday after a rocket was launched at Israel, disrupting a relative lull in the war-torn territory at the start of a major Muslim holiday.
The strikes followed an almost 12-hour pause in fighting and came as international efforts intensified to end the three-week conflict between Israel and Hamas. The U.N. called for an "immediate" cease-fire.
Israel's military said it struck two rocket launchers and a rocket manufacturing facility in central and northern Gaza after a rocket hit southern Israel early Monday. The rocket caused no damage or injuries.
Earlier, the Israeli military said it had not carried out any attacks in Gaza since 9:30 p.m. on Sunday but that troops on the ground were pressing on with efforts to destroy the cross-border tunnels constructed by Hamas for attacks inside Israel.
The military said it opened artillery fire on Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza in response to the rocket fired at Ashkelon, said the office of Israel's military spokesman. "Quiet will be met with quiet," the office statement said.
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At least 8 civilians killed as hostilities in eastern Ukraine intensify
KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — At least eight civilians have been killed by fighting and shelling in two Ukrainian cities held by separatist militants, officials in the rebellion-wracked east said Monday.
Authorities in Luhansk that five people were killed and 15 injured by overnight artillery strikes. Three were killed in Donetsk as a result of clashes, the city's government said.
Territory between the cities has seen intensified fighting as government troops try to gain control over the area where a Malaysia Airlines plane was downed earlier this month.
Dutch and Australian police set off for the crash site Monday morning in a convoy of 20 cars, aiming to secure the area so that investigations can continue and any remaining bodies can be recovered.
Both sides in the conflict have traded accusations over the mounting civilian death toll. The armed conflict that has been raging for more than three months has displaced more than 200,000 people.
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Malaysia plane shoot-down response recalls Soviet evasiveness after 1983 Korean jet downing
Those searching for the truth about what happened in the shoot-down of the Malaysia airliner over Ukraine can take little comfort from the history of another passenger jet that was blasted out of the sky over the Soviet Union more than three decades ago: The Kremlin at the time dodged, weaved and obfuscated. Today, we still don't know what exactly happened to Korean Airlines Flight 007.
I was The Associated Press' Moscow bureau chief when a Soviet Sukhoi-15 fighter downed KAL 007 on Sept. 1, 1983. The passenger plane was about to leave Soviet airspace after more than two hours of flying off-course above super-secret military installations along the Pacific coast. Pilots on the New York to Seoul flight via Anchorage, Alaska, had apparently put wrong navigation points into the on-flight computer. All 269 people on board were killed.
For three days, the Soviets said little. Then, on the fourth day, came a flurry of confusing and unlikely accounts.
Authorities said the Red Army in the Far East mistook the KAL airliner, with the distinctive 747 hump at the front, for an American RS-135 spy plane, a modified Boeing 707. At the time, the United States maintained a fleet of the RS-135s around the world, many of them flying off the Pacific coast of Siberia.
That same day, Col. Gen. Semyon Romanov was quoted by the official TASS news agency as saying, "The horror of this is that the United States sent the plane on its dirty mission." Romanov declared the "South Korean plane flew from the United States as a rude and deliberate provocation."
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Police in China remove church's cross amid crackdown in region with thousands of believers
BEIJING (AP) — Hundreds of police took down a church's cross Monday in a city known as "China's Jerusalem" for its many houses of worship amid a crackdown on church buildings in a coastal region where thousands of people are embracing Christianity.
Evangelist Qu Linuo said he and about 200 others had rushed to the Longgang Huai En Church in the eastern city of Wenzhou to protect the building but peacefully made way for the police, who used a crane to remove the 3-meter-tall (10-foot-tall) red cross from its steeple.
Authorities told the church the cross violated building height limits, and returned it to the parishioners, who wept and prayed around it, said Qu, who is a member of another church. A man at the county's public security office said he didn't know anything about the incident, and the Longgang township police didn't answer phone calls.
Across Zhejiang province, where Wenzhou is located, authorities have toppled or threatened to topple crosses at more than 130 Protestant churches. In a few cases, the government has even razed sanctuaries.
Officials say they're enforcing building codes, although often they won't specify which ones. They also deny they are specifically targeting churches, and point to the demolition of tens of thousands of other buildings, religious and non-religious, that have apparently broken regulations.
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Police: Family of 5, including 3 children, found fatally shot in Maine apartment
SACO, Maine (AP) — Neighbors struggled to make sense of the shooting deaths of a family of five in which the father was known to many throughout their apartment complex as a friendly maintenance worker.
Three children ranging from 4 to 12 were among the victims discovered Sunday in their home along with a long-barreled gun believed to have been used in their deaths. A detective said murder-suicide was one of the scenarios being investigated.
"I still don't want to believe it," said Heather Nason, who used to babysit the three children. "I love those children like they were my own."
Investigators said it appeared no one outside the family was responsible for the shootings. They planned to release the identities on Monday.
The grisly discovery was made after a family friend contacted an apartment complex worker to express concerns about the family's well-being, investigators said. The worker entered the apartment and discovered one body, then immediately called police.
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Kevin Bacon gives 'The Following' fans at Comic-Con a chance to be part of his 'Six Degrees'
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Kevin Bacon's "Six Degrees" world got even bigger Sunday at Comic-Con.
During a Sunday panel for his Fox show "The Following," a fan brought up the pop culture game known as "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon," whose premise is anyone in Hollywood can be linked to the actor. She wondered if by talking to him she could then be a part of his universe.
Bacon said that technically you need to be in a movie with him to be connected in the "Six Degrees" world.
The actor then stood up and took a video of the crowd in the San Diego Convention Center's 6,500-seat Hall H.
He also got laughs when a young girl told him she loved him in the 2011 movie "Crazy Stupid Love."
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Virus drugmaker fights back against pediatricians group's limits on medicine use for preemies
CHICAGO (AP) — A costly drug given mostly to premature babies is at the center of a clash between the manufacturer and the nation's leading pediatrician's group, which recommends scaling back use of the medicine.
The dispute involves new guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics, which say medical evidence shows the drug benefits few children other than very young preemies. The medicine guards against a common but usually mild virus that can cause serious lung problems.
It's the second time in two years that the influential group has recommended narrowing use of the drug, sold by MedImmune under the brand name Synagis (SIN'-uh-jis). MedImmune is fighting back with full-page newspaper ads that say the updated policy threatens "our most vulnerable babies."
Synagis protects against RSV, or respiratory syncytial (sin-SISH'-uhl) virus, which infects nearly all U.S. children by the age of 2. For most, it causes only mild, cold-like symptoms. But it is also the most common cause of pneumonia in U.S. infants, and as many as 125,000 young children are hospitalized with RSV each year, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
It was approved in 1998 for use in certain "high-risk" children, based on research showing benefits for certain children including premature infants born at 35 weeks or earlier. The pediatricians' group says it has sought to provide more specific guidance because the government's definition of high risk is vague.
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Baseball immortality for The Big Hurt, Glavine, Maddux, and managers Torre, La Russa and Cox
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. (AP) — Frank Thomas choked back tears, Joe Torre apologized for leaving people out of his speech and Tony La Russa said he felt uneasy.
Being enshrined in the Hall of Fame can have those effects, even on the greats.
Thomas, pitchers Tom Glavine and Greg Maddux, and managers Bobby Cox, Torre and La Russa were inducted into the baseball shrine Sunday, and all paid special tribute to their families before an adoring crowd of nearly 50,000.
"I'm speechless. Thanks for having me in your club," Thomas said, getting emotional as he remembered his late father. "Frank Sr., I know you're watching. Without you, I know 100 percent I wouldn't be here in Cooperstown today. You always preached to me, 'You can be someone special if you really work at it.' I took that to heart, Pop."
"Mom, I thank you for all the motherly love and support. I know it wasn't easy."
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