A top Obama administration official warned Sunday that the Gulf of Mexico oil spill might not be stopped until late summer after BP's latest attempt to plug the leak failed.

The "American people need to know" that it's "possible we will have oil leaking from this well until August, when the relief wells will be finished," said Carol Browner, the White House energy advisor.

Browner said on CBS that Energy Secretary Steven Chu and a team of scientists on Saturday essentially put a halt to BP's attempt to cap the spewing well through a process known as "top kill." The administration team worried that the increasing pressure from heavy drilling mud being forced into the well to seal it actually would make the leak worse.

Obama was in Grand Isle, Lousiana today to talk about BP's oil disaster. Here's some video from AP. "Right now we're still within the window where we don't know the outcome," he says.

We will probably find out this weekend whether BP's "top kill" idea is going to seal the gash for good. The procedure has never been tried this deep before. BP had to temporarily suspend the procedure for a second time in two days.

The suspension of the effort was not announced, and appeared to again contradict statements by company and government officials that suggested the top kill procedure was progressing Friday. Andrew Gowers, a BP spokesman, said he would not give “blow-by-blow commentaries.” He added: “The operation is by definition a series of phases of pumping mud and shooting bridging materials and junk and reading pressure gauges. It is going to keep going, perhaps 48 more hours.”

If the top kill and junk shots fail, BP officials planned to try again to place a containment vessel over the leak, which might allow them to capture the oil but would not stop the leak. A previous attempt failed.

Meanwhile, pundits are trying to calculate the political implications of this mess. Via Swampland:

It's tempting to judge situations like this on the daily ups and downs of politics, but real impact of the oil spill on Obama will only become clear in the weeks and months to come. If the spill is capped quickly, BP is made to pay the entire tab for cleanup and damages and new better regulations are put into place to prevent such a catastrophe in the future, the political damage could be minimized. But if the well continues to gush unabated, local and state officials lodge legitimate complaints about federal roadblocks or, even worse, there's a whiff of federal abandonment before the region's inhabitants are made whole again, Obama could suffer mightily.

Visit eBird's Gulf interactive map for information on the region's vulnerable bird populations and the impacts they face from the oil disaster. Earlier this month, Birding Phil over at Trails provided excellent insight on the Gulf's migratory bird population.

A quick review of this past week's happenings in the blog world

The Climate Crossroads Bicycle haiku (bike-ku) contest ends Monday. It's easy to enter! All you have to do is join the Bicycle group, post a picture, and paste in a haiku. Since May is National Bike Month, the contest is all in good fun. But there are some serious prizes.

The top prize is a Breezer Uptown 8. And two runners-up will get a Nutcase helmet and a Kryptonite lock. Congressman Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, an avid bicyclist and author of H.R. 4722, the Active Community Transportation Act, will choose the grand prize winner. A panel of bike happy Sierra Club staffers will select the finalists next week.

Go ahead and enter our Bike-ku contest, but don't end up in court like these dudes on account of our contest. (It's pretty funny watching Judge Judy grapple with the price of this stolen bike -- check it out at the four-minute mark.)



(Via Gawker.)

(From the ICLEI USA Local Action blog; by Rena Ragimova)

On Earth Day. April 22, 2010 Denver, CO launched the first U.S. citywide B-cycle bike sharing program. The program has been popularized in over 50 cities Europe and Asia and has recently started making its way to North America. B-cycle members can pick up and return their bike at over 500 B-cycle stations around Denver and surrounding areas.

[ editor's note: On Earth Day Oliver Bock, a Sierra Club member, and his sister, left the Bay Area on a cross-country adventure on electric bicycles. Follow Oliver's journey at his blog. We will be posting some of his writings here.]

If executed incorrectly, however, the top kill could blow the fail-safe systems, dramatically increasing the flow of oil.

1. Stop the gusher
2. Now is not the time for new drilling
3. Make the Gulf communities and environment whole
4. Demand more accountability and transparency from government and industry
5. End dependence on oil and move to a new clean energy economy

• Margie Alt, Executive Director, Environment America
• Lt. General John Castellaw, US Marine Corps
• Gene Karpinski, President, League of Conservation Voters
• Mindy Lubber, President, Ceres
• Kevin Knoblach, President, Union of Concerned Scientists

At about 2:50 of this clip, Sen. Alexander of Tennessee compares the BP disaster to an plane crash. "We can't stop flying just because we have a terrible airplane crash, but we can do everything we can to make sure we don't have another one," he says.

Does this analogy hold water (or oil)? I like Sierra Club's tweeted response: "Sen. Alexander, this BP oil disaster is more comparable to the Hindenberg -- when’s the last time you flew on a dirigible?"

The way to "make sure we don't have another" disaster is to end offshore drilling for good. Take action and let your elected representatives know that you mean business.

Announced Thursday, the hooking up of Tesla with Toyota took everybody by surprise. As part of the deal, Tesla is buying the giant NUMMI plant in Fremont, CA. This facility has an interesting history as told in this excellent piece from This American Life. Tesla's CEO, Elon Musk, lusted after this plant early in the search for a manufacturing plant for their Model S, but the size of the plant at 5.3 million sq ft was too much for his needs. With Toyota's desire to build a low-cost EV using a Tesla designed drivetrain, all of a sudden, the numbers started to work.



According to GreenBeat, "Again, this is a pretty radical change of pace for Tesla — and it’s apparently come about very quickly. The company had been interested in the NUMMI facility for a while. It met with the plant’s representatives about three months ago with no results. About a month ago, Akio Toyoda, president and CEO of Toyota, approached Musk about a potential strategic partnership, and the two executives hit it off, Musk says".

Also from GreenBeat:

1. The joint development of a brand new,sub- $30,000 electric car, that will contain Tesla’s unique powertrain design, with everything else built by Toyota;

2. The purchase of the NUMMI plant, where Tesla plans to manufacture both its Model S sedan due out in 2012, a new $30,000 Tesla-designed vehicle, and the more affordable jointly designed “third-generation” vehicle;

3. A $50 million investment from Toyota into Tesla when the company goes public, probably later this year.

All in all, this is great news! We'll have more choices in the EV world in a few years. The Volts and Leafs will prime the market for late entries, and if we get a decent energy bill that assigns a price to carbon, then the cost of gas will rise making more and more people make the switch.

UPDATE (5/26): Amid pressure, BP has agreed to keep the camera rolling during its "top kill" attempt.

Click here to get a clear glimpse of BP's live shot of the leaking well before it goes dark. Yeah, that's right. BP plans to cut off the feed tomorrow before it moves forward with its so-called "top kill" procedure in which "heavy mud and cement are to be shot into the well to plug it up. The procedure has never been tried a mile beneath the sea, and company executives estimate its chances of success at 60 to 70 percent."

Don't miss The Big Picture's gallery of the BP oil disaster. The oil has reached Louisiana's shore and the sights are tragic and stunning. Of the photos, the one pictured here of a dragonfly with splotches of oil on its wings really stands out. Other images include a saturated crab, a dying heron weighted down by thick oily filth, and the bare foot of an eight-year-old beachgoer with small specks of oil on it.

Here's the president's weekly address. "Even as we continue to hold BP accountable, we also need to hold Washington accountable," he says. Obama adds that we cannot let this kind of thing happen again. But today's New York Times reports on several other offshore drilling projects moving forward since BP's explosion last month.

In the days since President Obama announced a moratorium on permits for drilling new offshore oil wells and a halt to a controversial type of environmental waiver that was given to the Deepwater Horizon rig, at least seven new permits for various types of drilling and five environmental waivers have been granted, according to records.

I've gathered a few videos from this past week about BP's oil disaster. In case you missed it, Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune appeared on MSNBC's "Hardball" to discuss, among other things, Rush Limbaugh's hilarity.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

BP's handling of its massive gash in the ocean floor has been less than exemplary. It's been a month since the deadly explosion. And one reason why there's so much outrage is that significantly more oil is flowing from the leak than what BP had claimed.

Even Fox News is dismayed by BP's conduct throughout this whole mess.



But senatorial candidate and Civil Rights Act critic Rand Paul of Kentucky seems to think that Obama's tough words for BP were "really un-American" (at around the six-minute mark).

When Peter Sinclair isn't exposing the follies that come from climate-change denialism, he's making videos about real solutions. Here's his latest about wind. (Also, read my interview from a few months back about small wind.) I like the point he makes at the two-minute mark: critics say wind is faulty because it fluctuates. Well, supplies of dirty energy fluctuate as well, Mr. Smarty Pants. Enjoy and learn!

Another big break came today in the Rose Garden of the White House when President Obama announced that, for the first time, the federal government will establish fuel-efficiency and greenhouse-pollution standards for heavy-duty trucks as well as for passenger vehicles. In a relatively short time, such standards could reduce emissions from long-distance trucking by one third.

The president had another, equally important, announcement: The EPA, Department of Transportation, and California will collaborate to set emission and efficiency standards for cars and light-duty passenger vehicles on a much longer time horizon. That's an essential step for letting automakers know: "You've got 15 years here, but you have to get off oil." Although those standards weren't announced today, this is still a huge breakthrough in the reshaping of the American transportation sector so that it can free itself from the grip of oil.

A quick review of this past week's happenings in the blog world

New Truck Emissions Standards a Strong Start
New Rules Will Decrease U.S. Global Warming Pollution, Oil Dependence

Washington, D.C. – President Barack Obama is announcing today that the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are setting the first-ever emissions standards for medium and heavy duty trucks starting in 2014 and will begin the next round of standards for cars and light trucks for 2017 and beyond.

Statement of Carl Pope, Chairman of Sierra Club

With the oil disaster in the Gulf showing us of the true cost of our oil dependence, we applaud President Obama for this historic announcement to improve the fuel economy of trucks. We urge the administration to set the strongest standards to drive us towards an oil-free energy future.

We need to end our dependence on oil as quickly as possible and the steps the President announced today will help us move us closer to that goal while also cleaning the air we breathe.

After cars and light trucks, freight trucks are the second largest consumers of oil – burning more than 2.4 million barrels per day and growing. Right now these trucks only average 6 miles per gallon--a number that has remained virtually unchanged since the 1970’s.

We are thrilled that the administration is moving forward with the next round of standards for cars and light trucks. Setting standards for vehicles for the longer term is needed to push old technology out and bring in the new. We are pleased that California is joining with EPA and NHTSA in looking at technology, continuing its critical leadership in setting a high bar for reducing vehicle greenhouse gas pollution.

For heavy duty trucks, these standards are a great start, but it is important to begin moving more freight by rail. This will yield the greatest savings in both oil and global warming pollution.

As part of the plan to end our oil dependence, we are also calling on President Obama to issue a presidential moratorium on offshore drilling. We already have the technology to create a clean, 21st century transportation system that will end our addiction to oil. We've been talking about getting off oil for decades. The disaster in the Gulf is a wake up call. It's time to get off oil and on to clean energy.

Interestingly, the bill would make virtually no difference to the solar and wind industries. But that's not too surprising -- the Senate's renewable energy standard is woefully weak, and not likely to do much to improve on existing state standards.

[ editor's note: On Earth Day Oliver Bock, a Sierra Club member, and his sister, left the Bay Area on a cross-country adventure on electric bicycles. Follow Oliver's journey at his blog. We will be posting some of his writings here.]

From the road in Durango ... including "poppa wheelies" bike delivery service checking out the bikes.




Jeff Litton of ugena.org joined the Green Riders for the first couple of days of the ride and created this video which is a great introduction to what the Green Riders are doing and why. http://ugena.org/thegreenriders/

This image by European Space Agency shows the Gulf's loop current and its role in how it'll influence the oil slick's path. The picture was taken by ESA's Envisat satellite. (h/t Space Gizmo.)

In terms of recent media news -- in case you missed it -- radio clown Rush Limbaugh demanded to know when the Sierra Club will pay for the clean-up (yeah, he wasn't kidding) ; NYT's Thomas Friedman pondered why the White House hasn't toughened up on the country's oil addiction in light of BP's disaster; and we all marked our calendars for Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune's appearance tonight on MSNBC's "Hardball." We'll post it here when the segment becomes available.

Join the BP Oil Disaster group on Climate Crossroads for the latest news and pictures.

The foundation's creators are hoping to support organizations that meet the foundation's three standards: Money must go as directly as possible to beneficiaries, not operating costs; it must help either wildlife or people whose livelihoods were directly affected by the Deepwater Horizon spill; and it must target needs not being addressed by government...

The article, entitled "Meatless Mondays, A Movement That Has Legs," covers all the angles of why people are doing it, as well as the meat industry's paranoid response. An excerpt:

It's enough to make the meat industry nervous. Over the past year, lobbying groups including the American Meat Institute, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, the National Pork Board and the Farm Bureau have launched a quiet campaign to try to reverse the momentum.

They have fired off missives to institutions that embrace the call to reduce meat consumption, and they have posted talking points for meat producers on the Internet. They are also making a final push to ensure that the government recommendation of two servings of meat per day remains enshrined in the new dietary guidelines that the Department of Agriculture will release this fall....

In response, the meat industry has stressed science...To environmentalists, they point to new research that challenges widely publicized statistics that livestock production creates more greenhouse gases than forms of automated transportation.

Nervous meat producers! Could be a good band name. Are you into Meatless Mondays?

First up is the "Advancing the Science of Climate Change" report:

The core phenomenon, scientific questions, and hypotheses (of global warming) have been examined thoroughly and have stood firm in the face of serious debate and careful evaluation of alternative explanations.

Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for - and in many cases is already affecting - a broad range of human and natural systems... It calls for a new era of climate change science where an emphasis is placed on "fundamental, use-inspired" research, which not only improves understanding of the causes and consequences of climate change but also is useful to decision makers at the local, regional, national, and international levels acting to limit and adapt to climate change....

The report recommends that a single federal entity or program be given the authority and resources to coordinate a national, multidisciplinary research effort aimed at improving both understanding and responses to climate change.

• Strong U.S. actions to reduce emissions will help encourage other countries to do the same.

• An inclusive national policy framework is needed to ensure that all levels of government, the private sector, and millions of households and individuals are contributing to shared national goals.

• The U.S. should establish a greenhouse gas emissions "budget" that sets a limit on total domestic emissions over a set period of time and provides a clear, directly measurable goal.

• The longer the nation waits to begin reducing emissions, the harder and more expensive it will likely be to reach any given emissions target.

• A carbon-pricing system is the most cost-effective way to reduce emissions.

• Carbon pricing alone, however, is not enough to sufficiently reduce domestic emissions.

"(B)oosting U.S. adaptive capacity now can be viewed as 'an insurance policy against an uncertain future,' while inaction could increase risks, especially if the rate of climate change is particularly large."

Conclusions from this report include:

• Policymakers need to anticipate a range of possible climate conditions and that uncertainty about the exact timing and magnitude of impacts is not a reason to wait to act.

• A national adaptation strategy is needed to facilitate cooperation and collaboration across all lines of government and between government and other key parties, including the private sector, community organizations, and nongovernmental organizations.

• We must identify vulnerabilities to climate change impacts and begin to examine adaptation options that will improve resilience.

• Adaptation to climate change should not be seen as an alternative to attempts to limit it.

These reports were requested by Congress and funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the National Academy of Sciences will release two more reports later this year as part of the America's Climate Choices series.

Lisa Gautier, who co-founded Matter of Trust, is partnering with other organizations in an ongoing drive to deliver tons of hair stuffed in pantyhose to the Gulf to soak up the oil. Yesterday I had the opportunity to chat with her on the phone. She's a pretty busy person these days. Matter of Trust began its hair collecting drive 10 years ago. The effort really took off after the Cosco Busan spill three years ago. But it was only after the BP disaster last month that the hair idea exploded.

"My phone is just ringing off the hook," Gautier told me.

She told me that May 20 will be the day hair by the truckloads will be heading to the Gulf. And we're not just talking about human hair.

"Because this is the shearing season, sheep farmers and alpaca farmers are just trucking it in," she told me. "It's coming in droves."

It sure seems like a better idea than lighting the slick on fire. Hair naturally takes in oil. That's why we shampoo it out.

Gautier's efforts have paid off with press coverage. The New York Times, CNN, and Reuters are among the dozens of outlets that have provided coverage. (Gawker summarizes all the weird clean-up ideas in addition to hair.)

Here's a pretty great demonstration of what we're talking about:

If you want to donate your hair to help clean up BP's catastrophic mess, click here for the details.

Shell Oil Co. pledged Monday to deploy a prefabricated coffer dam ready for "immediate" use in the event of a blowout, with a full-scale oil spill response within an hour.

In a letter intended to reassure federal officials that offshore drilling can safely begin in the fragile Arctic in July despite the spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Shell said it also would be ready to apply dispersant immediately underwater near the source of any oil flow and would have a remotely operated submersible and trained divers at the drilling site.

After the Sierra Club and our partners began campaigning to end JPMorgan Chase's coal financing in September of 2008, JPMorgan Chase conducted an internal review of their environmental policies and financial support for coal companies engaged in mountaintop removal. Starting in 2009 JPMorgan Chase began an "enhanced due diligence" process for any potential financial transactions related to mountaintop removal coal mining, which means extra review of potential risks to their bottom line or their reputation.

As a result of that process JPMorgan Chase decided not to conduct business in 2009 with any coal companies engaged in "significant" mountaintop removal operations, such as Massey. While Bank of America and Citigroup have similar policies in place, JPMorgan Chase still lags behind Credit Suisse and Wells Fargo which have policies that end or phase out any financial involvement with companies engaged in mountaintop removal, respectively.

Here is the most recent 72-hour trajectory map created by NOAA. Get a closer look here (pdf). Observers are worried the slick is going to head on over to the Florida Keys.

The loop current could carry oil from the spill east and spread it about 450 miles to the Florida Keys, while the Louisiana coastal current could move the oil as far west as central Texas.

The depth of the gushing leaks and the use of more than 580,000 gallons of chemicals to disperse the oil, including unprecedented injections deep in the sea, have helped keep the crude beneath the sea surface. Officials report that more than 390,000 gallons of chemicals are stockpiled. Marine scientists say diffusing and sinking the oil helps protect the surface species and the Gulf Coast shoreline but increases the chance of harming deep-sea reefs.

If you didn't see "60 Minutes" last night, take a few minutes to watch these interviews.

This is part one of the segment:

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Here is part two. "I can tell I was floating in oil."

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Here's a quick clip with the men who videotaped the explosion from a fishing boat:

Watch CBS News Videos Online

I'm not making this up, folks. Take it away, Tony Hayward, BP CEO:

"The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume," he said.

The bike-ku contest here on Climate Crossroads is off to a great start. We've had more than 60 entries so far and there are still more than two weeks left for people to enter.

Remember, by entering you get the chance to win a brand new Breezer Uptown 8 bicycle. Runners-up will get a Kryptonite lock and a Nutcase helmet. A panel of bike-commuting Sierra Club staffers will pick the finalists and the winner will be selected by Congressman Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, founder of the Congressional Bicycle Caucus.

All you have to do is join the Bicycle group; post a picture; write a haiku. Your deadline is May 31. For more details visit the Bicycle group.

A quick review of this past week's happenings in the blog world

Back in January electric car infrastructure startup Better Place said it was in the process of raising a whopping $350 million to help it build out its network of charging and battery swap stations across nations like Israel and Denmark. Well, this morning, according to an SEC filing, it looks like the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company actually just closed that massive round.

That funding is one of the largest rounds for cleantech ever, and is similar in size to the huge fund-raising done by thin film solar company Solyndra. As of estimates in January, Better Place has raised about $750 million.

Well the ACS has long been criticized for overemphasizing cancer screening and treatment instead of prevention, and it has long insisted that only a small percentage of cancers have environmental or chemical causes, even as it concedes that we really have almost no data on how many cancers are caused by such chemical exposures.

By Carl Pope

Gov. Charlie Crist asked BP PLC on Wednesday to pay nearly $35 million for an emergency ad campaign to assure the world that Florida's beaches and coastal waters are untainted by the company's Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

The spill off Louisiana so far has stayed well away from the Florida Panhandle shoreline but that hasn't stopped thousands of wary tourists from canceling or declining to make reservations.

Crist earlier Wednesday promised the panel that oversees state tourism promotion he would help find money for efforts to counteract those fears.

Visit Florida currently has more than $2.5 million for an emergency promotions campaign, part of it cut from another campaign to battle the bad press and erroneous word-of-mouth claims that the spill has arrived on Florida shores. But it’s not enough, the tourism board members insisted. The constant news of the spill, including an erroneous Twitter message Wednesday about tar balls washing up on Destin’s shores, are discouraging visitors.

“As of yesterday, I can tell you, restaurant and hotel owners in the Panhandle, most of them hit the 911 button,” said Carol Dover, president and CEO of the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association.

Senators John Kerry and Joe Lieberman unveiled their anticipated climate legislation today. You can read Kerry's comments about it here. Guess what? He likes it! "Bottom line: it does what President Obama told the world we'd do -- it reduces greenhouse gas emissions to 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, and 80 percent below 2005 levels at 2050."

Environmental groups are eager but a little tepid. "We regret that bitter opposition from the dirty energy sources of the past like coal, oil, and nuclear has watered down this proposal in order to unduly subsidize energy technologies which already receive an unfair public bailout."

The details of this major piece of legislation are still emerging today. You can read Politico's coverage here. But as we learn more, we'll have more to say here on Climate Crossroads. Meantime, you can comment over at our vibrant politics thread.

Click here to read all about the BP-disaster protests that took place late last week. Great pictures!

Join the BP Oil Disaster group here on Climate Crossroads for all the latest on the disaster and the clean up.

(Thanks Nicole!)

An administration official who asked not to be identified because the plan is not yet public said Interior Secretary Ken Salazar will urge that Congress approve splitting the Minerals Management Service in two. One agency would be charged with inspecting oil rigs, investigating oil companies and enforcing safety regulations, while the other would oversee leases for drilling and collection of billions of dollars in royalties.

Currently, the Minerals Management Service, an arm of the Interior Department, is responsible for collecting more than $10 billion a year from oil and gas drilling and with enforcing laws and regulations that apply to drilling operations.

Some critics have said the two roles are in conflict and are one reason the agency has long been accused of being too cozy with the oil and natural gas industry.

[ editor's note: On Earth Day Oliver Bock, a Sierra Club member, and his sister, set off on a cross-country adventure on electric bicycles. Follow Oliver's journey at his blog. We will be posting some of his writings here as well. And join the Bicycle group here on Climate Crossroads.]

The mayor of Flagstaff tries out an electric bike ... and likes it!

Cruising through the high desert.

[ editor's note: On Earth Day Oliver Bock, a Sierra Club member, and his sister, set off on a cross-country adventure on electric bicycles. Follow Oliver's journey at his blog. We will be posting some of his writings here as well. And join the Bicycle group here on Climate Crossroads.]

We woke to more wind and predictions of 50 mph + winds by the afternoon. Even though it's Mother's Day, we managed to get Derrick to ride with us for the day and we headed out after saying goodbye to Linda (Derrick's mother in law). She was so sweet to us and we basked in her hospitality.

We went to Mc Donalds to get "the best coffee in town", unload our bikes, use the bathroom, load up on water and head out of town.

The first 25 miles or so were up a wide valley with smooth, rounded red rock cliffs just on our right. It was some of the most spectacular scenery we have seen and our friendly tailwind kept us smiling. Derrick was a delight. He enjoyed every minute of the ride and added his knowledge and fun commentary to our day.

We turned east and headed up the pass that would drop us into New Mexico. Again, tailwinds helped us up a somewhat challenging pass and we stopped to picnic right below the summit where the rest of Derrick's family met us. It was great hanging out with them and Sean played in the snow with the three kids until his hands hurt from making and throwing snowballs.

At the top of the pass, Catherine turned over the reins of her steed to Sean to avoid the long steep windy downhill. And it was a long, very steep downhill. I used my brakes most of the way down and had trouble keeping myself below 40 mph.

Sean disappeared immediately and I won't say how fast he went. Almost at the bottom, I got my first flat tire and did a roadside repair with the help of Catherine who stayed behind us and was able to stop and help me fix the flat.

We reached our destination and it was obvious that our path forward was full blown sandstorm again. So, after a fond farewell to our new friends Derrick and his family, we loaded up all the bikes and detoured up to Mesa Verde where I am now sitting in a campground while Catherine cooks mutton stew and we are looking forward to spending most of the day tomorrow exploring Mesa Verde.

It's sad to be leaving Navajo Country. The limited services and lack of internet barely registered on our radar when compared to the warmth and beauty of the Navajo lands and people. I will need to come back and I will never forget the strength and warmth of the Navajo's we were so lucky to get to know.

UPDATED:

• Dr. F.E. Beck - Associate Professor, Texas A&M University
• Mr. Danenberger - Former Chief, Offshore Regulatory Program, Minerals Management Service
• Mr. Lamar McKay - President and Chairman , BP America, Inc.
• Mr. Steven Newman - President and Chief Executive Officer, Transocean Limited
• Mr. Tim Probert - President, Global Business Lines; Chief Health, Safety and Environmental Officer, Halliburton

The Sierra Club has been holding a series of "Clean It Up!" events around the country calling on BP to clean up the disaster and demanding an end to new offshore drilling. Citizens have already turned out for rallies in Florida, Virginia, Seattle, New Hampshire, Michigan, and Houston.

On Saturday in New Orleans, the Sierra Club joined with fishing industry representatives, Gulf Coast leaders, and a crowd of more than 200 concerned citizens at a rally in support of Gulf Coast communities impacted by the BP Disaster.

"We are here to urge that President Obama dedicate every necessary resource his disposal to contain the well and stop the flow of oil," said Sierra Club president Allison Chin. "We need to clean up this disaster. The people who live in the Gulf Coast are looking at sweeping job losses and a destroyed ecosystem."

Last Thursday in Houston our Lone Star Chapter also held a brief presser and gathering outside an oil industry conference to call for more clean energy. They started the presser off with a fake speech from a fake oil industry spokesperson, "Oilivia Blackwater." Here's video of that:

Then the press conference got serious, as the group called for no more oil drilling, including a speech from a shrimper who spoke of the oil disaster's impact on her industry.

That message is present at all the "Clean It Up" rallies. "Offshore drilling is dirty and dangerous. This disaster could happen in Virginia, or California, or anywhere offshore oil rigs are allowed. We need an end to all new drilling off America's coasts. But that's not enough," said Chin at the New Orleans rally.

"We need our leaders to deliver a plan to get America off of oil and onto a clean, efficient, 21st century transportation system. We need to clean up the Gulf Coast, and we need to clean up America’s energy."

There are more clean energy rallies and events coming up to counter this terrible oil disaster - are you going to one? You can even sign up to host one!

New Orleans photos by David Graham-Caso. Houston photos by Zac Trahan.

Sick of oil? Do you bike instead? Do you haiku?

Enter our bike-ku contest for the chance to win a brand new Breezer Uptown 8 bicycle. Runners-up will get a Kryptonite lock and a Nutcase helmet. A panel of bike-commuting Sierra Club staffers will pick the finalists and the winner will be selected by Congressman Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, founder of the Congressional Bicycle Caucus.

It's National Bike Month and with news of oil spills clogging up your ears, there's no better time to celebrate our beloved, emissions-free, two-wheeled pals.

All you have to do is join the Bicycle group; post a picture; write a haiku. Your deadline is May 31. For more details visit the Bicycle group.

What I saw flying over the gulf waters Wednesday, and what we've all been watching on television the last two weeks, is no spill. It's an endless explosion of toxic muck, a sickening creep of poisonous sludge that may soon blanket a national park, more than a dozen wildlife refuges and hundreds of miles of coastline, perhaps even oozing into the fragile Florida Keys and up the Eastern Seaboard.

This catastrophe may also prove to be one of those rare events that rivets attention, bolsters resolve and encourages pivotal change — in this case, a national commitment to stop the expansion of offshore drilling immediately and end our dependence on oil and the other dirty fuels that are fouling our planet in a slow-motion environmental disaster every day.

In western Canada, monstrous earthmoving machines rip up forests and pollute freshwater supplies to produce dirty oil from Alberta's "tar sands." In Ecuador, billions — with a "b" — of gallons of oil-contaminated waste were dumped into the Amazon watershed by Texaco, now owned by Chevron. And here in the U.S., 90 million Americans live near 150-plus oil refineries. These refineries release into the air and water millions of pounds of cancer-causing chemicals, such as benzene, butadiene and formaldehyde, along with nickel, lead and other pollutants linked to heart disease, asthma and other health threats.

PBS is providing a widget that displays a ticker meauring the amount of oil that BP's disaster has pumped into the Gulf. We've embedded it into the BP Oil Disaster group here on Climate Crossroads. So check it out. Join the group for more updates and correspondence from the ground.

Halt U.S. Offshore Drilling After BP Oil Spill: Michael Brune
May 05, 2010, 9:30 PM EDT

May 6 (Bloomberg) -- The death of 11 oil workers and the devastation of the Gulf Coast’s ecosystems and economy by the toxic sludge gushing from a BP Plc accident site is a tragedy that may well change the course of our nation. Americans are horrified. Leaders who had been willing to give offshore drilling the benefit of a doubt have abruptly changed their minds, including California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who said he no longer supports a plan to allow limited drilling for oil off his state’s coast.

They’re right. There is no safe way to drill for oil in oceans. This disaster is an impetus to halt our dependence on oil completely and move to a clean energy future fast.

Thanks to the Internet, you don't need a time machine to look back at what happened after the infamous Exxon Valdez spill of 1989. Exxon fought tooth and nail in the court system and basically got away with a slap on the wrist. After years and years of litigation, the Supreme Court two years ago sided with Exxon and reduced the previous ruling of $2.5 billion in punitive damages to a paltry $500 million. And these days, Exxon's pockets are blooming again.

Obama swears BP will pay for this one. But can we be so sure? Take action and tell your representatives that additional offshore drilling is no longer acceptable.

[ editor's note: On Earth Day Oliver Bock, a Sierra Club member, and his sister, set off on a cross-country adventure on electric bicycles. Follow Oliver's journey at his blog. We will be posting some of his writings here as well. And join the Bicycle group here on Climate Crossroads.]

Woke to a really cold morning and dashed off to the lodge for breakfast. Sean wanted pancakes.

After doing the ritual computer work, we walked out to the rim for a morning look and farewell. It was a crystal clear morning and since it was still pretty early, there were almost no people out. There was a school group that we passed on the trail who were all walking with their eyes closed holding on to each others shoulders until they reached the rim and were allowed to open their eyes. A moment most of them will always remember.

We unloaded our bikes about 20 miles outside of Flagstaff and rode into town to make our 2 o'clock meeting with the folks at Southwest WindPower. On the way, we stopped by The Grand Canyon Trust where we met some of the kind staff people I have been talking with over the last several months. They invited us to stay in their beautiful office which is a converted homestead farmhouse with solar panels and all sorts of energy efficiency features incorporated into the remodel.

We learned that our contact Derrick Terry in Window Rock has been very busy putting together a big event for next Saturday where a lot of Navajo sustainability people will show up as well as some of the staff from here. We are completely flabbergasted by how motivated people are to help spread the sustainability message. As The Green Riders, I feel like we are unleashing an opportunity for local communities to stand up and shout about the good they are doing and how much more needs to be done.

We rode down to SouthWest WindPower and met with Miriam Robbins, the marketing director. She gave us a great tour and spoke passionately about the need for alternatives when it comes to energy production. It was refreshing to hear her talk about the renewables as a family and consumers get to pick the renewable sibling that best suits their resource. If sun is in your air, go with solar. If it's wind, choose a turbine.

Even though Paul Gipe doesn't think small scale solar and wind contribute enough, quickly enough, he also said we need it all. So small scale distributed energy has its place. The value it gives to the user as a doorway into becoming engaged in building a sustainable future can be way more significant than the actual watts being produced by their home renewable energy system.

Tonight we are settled into the very nice offices with lots of computer access, wonderful maps and posters and even a firehouse next door!

Tomorrow is a big day. Our first real event where we will set up our roadshow and see what happens!!

It's no mystery that the right-wing echo chamber sometimes resorts to lies when smearing the president. Take for example the falsehood that the Sierra Club described Obama's response to the BP oil disaster as "worse than Katrina." It's all part of the echo chamber's parallel reality and "Obama's Katrina" mantra. Comparing BP's disaster to Hurricane Katrina is more like apples and oranges. But if you want to pin this on one individual, Dick Cheney is better suited to fit the bill:

After the Bush administration took office, the MMS became a cesspool of corruption and conflicts of interest. In September 2008, Earl Devaney, Interior’s Inspector General, delivered a report to Secretary Dirk Kempthorne that has to be read to be believed. One section, headlined “A Culture of Ethical Failure,” documented the belief among numerous MMS staff that they were “exempt from the rules that govern all other employees of the Federal Government.” They adopted a “private sector approach to essentially everything they did.” This included “opting themselves out of the Ethics in Government Act.” On at least 135 occasions, they accepted gifts and gratuities from oil and gas companies with whom they worked. One of the employees even had a lucrative consulting arrangement with a firm doing business with the government. And in a laconic sentence that speaks volumes, the IG reported: “When confronted by our investigators, none of the employees involved displayed remorse.”

So here’s my question: what is responsible for MMS’s change of heart between 2000 and 2003 on the crucial issue of requiring a remote control switch for offshore rigs? What we do know is that unfettered oil drilling was to Dick Cheney’s domestic concerns what the invasion of Iraq was to his foreign policy—a core objective, implacably pursued regardless of the risks. Is there a connection between his infamous secret energy task force and the corrupt mindset that came to dominate a key program within MMS? Would $500,000 per rig have been regarded as an unacceptably expensive insurance policy if a drill-baby-drill administration hadn’t placed its thumb so heavily on the scale?

Still, after every disaster, the oil industry promises that it could never happen again.

I don't think so. It's time to start phasing out offshore oil production now, as a first step to making America genuinely independent of oil.

Billions of dollars are at stake. Not to mention reputations of leaders in business, academia and government. Even the public image of our country on the world stage is hanging in the balance. 



Despite differing viewpoints on nuclear energy, coal-fired power plants, wind energy and a variety of important subjects in the world of green, one consistent theme emerged at the Fortune Brainstorm Green conference, held earlier this month at the sumptuous Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel Resort in Southern California. And that is: we need an official, approved and legislated policy on carbon reduction and we need it now. Not only careers, but also many thousands of jobs and potentially the future of our planet (not to mention Sierra Club Green Home.com) are all seemingly on "hold" until Washington can cobble together a bill on carbon reduction that will pass in the Senate.

Louie Miller, the Sierra Club's Mississippi State Director, was on The Ed Show on MSNBC yesterday. Some are calling the disaster "America's Chernobyl."

The oil slick has tripled and the ecological fallout is becoming more widespread.

Near Gulfport, Mississippi, 19 sea turtles were found dead and necropsies were being done by experts at the National Marine Fisheries Services. But they had no external oil soiling and it was not clear if the deaths were linked to the slick.

U.S. energy output from the Gulf has not been not strongly affected and shipping operations at the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port were normal, a port spokeswoman said.

Many of the coastal communities in the path of the oil slick, including Venice on the west bank of the Mississippi River, were devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

"It's just like Katrina, catastrophic," said Frances Lacross, a local resident.

Three House committees, including Energy and Commerce, Natural Resources and Oversight have scheduled hearings. A special House subcommittee that deals with global warming has called on executives from five major oil companies to testify. And three Democratic senators introduced legislation which would raise liability caps on oil companies from $75 million to $10 billion. Republicans, meanwhile, want to turn the focus back on the federal government, with one top House Republican calling for an investigation of the Minerals Management Service, which oversees offshore drilling.

Reports are surfacing that BP is offering folks along the Gulf $5,000 in exchange for giving up their right to sue. BP spokespeople have since said they are no longer asking people to sign waivers. Read the article at Talking Points Memo:

Sid Jackson, a Mobile-based lawyer representing a shrimper who last week filed suit against BP, claiming that the spill had already taken a financial toll on his business, told TPMmuckraker that he believed BP would be wise to back down. "I think they kind of drop-kicked that [waiver] clause into the fine print," Jackson said. But, "I think it would backfire" if BP tried to enforce it.

"This is the same company that told the coast guard there was no leak," Jackson added.

How are animals going to survive when their natural habitat has been contaminated by all this 02?!

If you're looking for the latest coverage of the oil spill, we got your back. My first suggestion is the New York Times:

The effort comes as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the oil slick appears to be drifting toward the Alabama and Florida coasts, including the Chandeleur Islands off Louisiana’s southern tip.

President Obama visited Louisiana on Sunday afternoon for a firsthand look at the response effort, while officials for BP described in detail their desperate efforts to seal the gushing well.

“The oil that is still leaking from the well could seriously damage the economy and the environment of our gulf states and it could extend for a long time,” Mr. Obama said. “It could jeopardize the livelihoods of thousands of Americans who call this place home.”

On Monday, BP said it would pay “all necessary and appropriate clean-up costs" from the disaster. "BP takes responsibility for responding to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. We will clean it up," the company said in a statement.

If you're looking for some lunchtime reading read this: "Sierra Club on oil spill: 'We were right'". And take a listen to this NPR segment about the far-reaching implications of this catastrophe.

AP tells us here that the weather is not cooperating:



CBS shows us that wildlife will be devestated. Duh!

I can't believe that with all this deep, loose soil, which has a lot of manure and compost in it, and a better watering system, I won't get a bumper crop. We'll see.

You may be thinking that all this sounds like a lot of work for someone purporting to be lazy.

Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune's column on CNN was front and center all weekend. Take a read. Here's a little snippet:

We are pleased that the White House is now saying it will suspend any new offshore drilling while the explosion and spill are investigated, but there should be no doubt left that drilling will only harm our coasts and the people who live there.

Taking a temporary break from offshore drilling is an important step, but it's not enough. We need to stop new offshore drilling for good, now. And then we need an aggressive plan to wean America from dirty fossil fuels in the next two decades.

This BP offshore rig that exploded was supposed to be state-of-the-art. We've also been assured again and again that the hundreds of offshore drilling rigs along our beaches are completely safe. Now, we've seen workers tragically killed. We've seen our ocean lit on fire, and now we're watching hundreds of thousands of gallons of toxic oil seep toward wetlands and wildlife habitat.