Today's Climate: June 12, 2009

DOE Announces $1B to Restart Planning for FutureGen CCS Plant (Wired)

The Department of Energy announced a $1 billion agreement today to restart planning for the controversial FutureGen project, an experimental power plant in Illinois that seeks to capture CO2 emissions from burning coal and store them underground.

Blocked Drilling Leases May Be Reinstated (Los Angeles Times)

Under pressure from GOP lawmakers, the Obama administration is considering reinstating more than a third of the 77 oil- and gas-drilling leases near national parks in the Mountain West that it blocked.

Farm State Wish List Could Hold Key to Climate Bill (Wall Street Journal)

House Agriculture Chairman Collin Peterson bluntly warned in a hearing that climate legislation doesn’t stand a chance of passing unless it’s amended to assuage the fears of Farm Belt lawmakers. He also took his complaints to Nancy Pelosi.

Sen. Boxer: Senate Energy Bill on Tight Deadline (Politico)

Sen. Barbara Boxer expects to mark up a Senate version of climate and energy legislation before the August recess. It will be based on the House bill but is likely to include tougher short-term targets for capping carbon dioxide.

Russia to Bolster Presence in Energy-Rich Arctic (AP)

Russia will rebuild its Soviet-era network of polar stations and use its icebreaker fleet to help support its claim to the vast resources of the Arctic, the man who led a mission to plant a Russian flag on the Arctic seabed says.

Virtual Power Plants Could Tame Grid Chaos (New Scientist)

Treating groups of dispersed power sources, such as solar and wind generators, as a single virtual power plant would overcome many of the problems with intermittent sources without requiring radical changes to the current grid infrastructure.

U.S. Startup Turning Human Waste into Fuel (Reuters)

Fifty miles east of Los Angeles, a small and inconspicuous facility is using something most of us would rather not think about to create a resource we can't live without.

World's Science Academies Push for G8 Climate Action (Reuters)

Science academies from the Group of Eight industrialized nations, plus Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa, called on the G8 to include tackling climate change in its efforts next month to rebuild the global economy. 

Peru Suspends Deforestation Decrees that Fueled Amazon Violence (AFP)

Peruvian lawmakers suspended a controversial law that had eased restrictions on lumber harvesting in the Amazon rainforest and that had sparked deadly clashes between police and indigenous protesters.

FEMA Measuring Climate Change Impact on Flood Insurance (New York Times)

Federal officials are struggling to calculate the fiscal impact that climate change could have on the nation's troubled public flood insurance program, amid predictions of intensifying downpours and more potent hurricanes.