MUENCHHAUSEN, March 31, 2017

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT,

RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD

JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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March 31, 2017

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WELCOME!
The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications.
The Green Baron also welcomes comments from anyone who may read Muenchhausen. Please send comments to the e-mail address above.

PLEASE PARDON OUR ABSENCE

Please pardon the long absence of Muenchhausen from the blogosphere. Mrs. TGB and TGB have had something of a rough winter, which saw Mrs. TGB take a fall on late-season winter ice. She sustained a fracture of a front portion of her pelvic bone. If there was any mitigation, it was that the fracture was what doctors call “closed”, so that surgery was deemed to be unnecessary. She is currently in the slow but apparently steady process of convalescence and has been given three weeks of in-home physical therapy. Her fall took place March 15, she was at Suburban Hospital for two nights, and came home the evening of March 16.

SOME RANDOM CURRENT MUSINGS

TGB wants to muse a bit about current situations in which we find ourselves, especially given the change of government that took place January 20 of this year. Let us consider, in passing, several factors.

Coal industry and fracking. Readers of Muenchhausen and of other publications might recall that during the 2008 presidential campaign, then-candidate Barack Obama spoke about essentially closing down the coal mining industry and coal-burning power plants. He said quite flatly, “Your electricity rates must necessarily skyrocket.”

Well, TGB saw his electricity rates increase (although not as much as his telephone/Internet costs). But new sources of—yes, fossil—energy were brought on line through the process of hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking. This process has helped temper increases in fossil-fuel prices, but it is not welcomed in many quarters. For example, New York and Maryland have instituted a moratorium on fracking, and it looks just about certain that Maryland will ban it altogether. Overseas, Scotland has levied an indefinite moratorium on the process (1).

Please do not misconstrue TGBs position. TGB would dearly love to see a world economy driven by energy from renewable sources. As he heard it said in 1974, during the height of the energy crunch of that year, “Using renewable energy is like living on investment returns. Using fossil energy is like living on your capital.” And he acknowledges progress, albeit slow, toward that goal. However, TGB would like to know by what scientific and engineering methods might this certainly worthy goal might be achieved.

Rescission of some regulations. Meanwhile, the current administration has rescinded, or is currently poised to rescind many of the regulations that have placed restrictions on coal mining and use. Several other environment/energy/climate-change agreements and regulations have been, are being, or are slated to be reversed or repealed. Salient among those are rules that grow out of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. When TGB and Mrs. TGB are in better shape, TGB hopes to discuss some of these rescissions and other similar or related topics in greater detail.

“See you in court!” TGB will sign off for now, in the hope that soon he can post more issues of Muenchhausen with greater frequency than he has in the past. Meanwhile, he will make one prediction with confidence: The current and future rescission of environmental/energy regulations, as well as the permission to complete the Keystone XL Pipeline and operate Dakota Access—these are just a very few examples—will most surely be challenged in court. Moreover, the plaintiffs in these cases likely will be quite adept at judge- and jury-shopping (please excuse TGB’s mild cynicism). TGB also believes the court papers already are prepared and ready for filing on, say, a day’s notice. He also fears that there could well be demonstrations, some of which could turn ugly.

TGB wishes all of his readers, whoever and wherever they may be, a Happy Easter and/or Happy Passover, whichever may apply.

REFERENCES

1. www.greenpeace.org.

MUENCHHAUSEN, JANUARY 25, 2017

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT, RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD
JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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January 2 , 2017
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WELCOME!

The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications.

IS KEYSTONE XL BACK?

Pipelines are the way to go — economically and environmentally (1): So it would appear, now that the federal administration has changed. Actually, there is not much construction to go to bring Keystone XL on line to carry crude oil from Alberta, Canada, to the US Gulf Coast states. As TGB understands it--please correct him if he is wrong--there are merely several miles to go through Nebraska. True, there will be permits needed from the state and perhaps some more approval from the State Department.

Simple, no? Uh, not so fast! TGB is fearlessly forecasting that there will be batteries of lawsuits launched to forestall further construction. He will not, however, predict the outcome of such lawsuits. It might, however be instructive to bear in mind that whatever hazards pipelines may pose--and yes, there are chances of spills and leaks--it may be considerably more dangerous to transport crude by train or truck. An extreme example of such a hazard was the fiery spill at Lac-Megantic, QC, Canada, July 6, 2013, in which an oil train was wrecked, nearby buildings were destroyed, and perhaps 47 people were killed and many more injured (2). TGB thinks he would rather take his chances with a pipeline for oil and even gas.

Lac-Megantic disaster.
Credit: Surete de Quebec.

SCARY OBITUARY
TGB happened to come across a scary obituary on Saturday, January 14, 2017. The decedent died of an infection that no antibiotic was able to cure, but perhaps most significantly, this cause was listed in a short death notice (3).



REFERENCES
1. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/pipelines-are-the-way-to-go-economically-and-environmentally/article/2592215#.V0X4_c0uMWo.blogger
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-M%C3%A9gantic_rail_disaster#/media/File:Lac_megantic_burning.jpg
3. Obituary column, The Washington Post, Jan. 14, 2017.

MUENCHHAUSEN, July 28, 2016

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT,

RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD

JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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July 28, 2016

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WELCOME!

The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications.

The Green Baron also welcomes comments from anyone who may read Muenchhausen. Please send comments to the e-mail address above.

OLD AGE, NEW TECH

Well, TGB is trying to bring his Muenchhausen blog back. He is soon to pass his 82^nd birthday, and as an entity from the mid-20^th century, he is sorely challenged by the new technology of the 21^st. TGB remembers manually-operated typewriters (who else remembers those!?) and actually used a Royal Portable to do much of his homework in grammar school (today called middle school) and high school. His parents obtained an IBM electric typewriter, vintage 1947, for their law office; in those days, one could only rent such a typewriter from IBM, and not purchase it. The right to purchase this machine came only after a US Supreme Court decision, or so TGB’s lawyer father told him during 1950s. So then they purchased the IBM electric and eventually took it home. After many years, it finally gave up the ghost, so to speak. TGB still has a late-20^th century Smith Corona electric that works. Ribbons may still be available for it, but should it fall into disrepair, TGB believes that persons skilled in repair of such old devices likely are no longer available.

So TGB finally went out and bought a Microsoft “Surface” 4 computer, along with a dock and a DVD player as extras (also a keyboard). This device is very light and easily portable, so TGB can sometimes go to his favorite hangout, the National Press Club (NPC, Washington, DC), and use Ethernet and surge suppressor facilities there. However, he has to learn the many intricacies of these devices and associated software, and this could, at his advanced age, be a lengthy process. Then, he needs to share any newly acquired skill with Mrs. TGB. It also is unsettling to realize that TGB often needs to appeal to his children, and even grandchildren, for help in usage of computers and associated peripheral devices and programs. One can but imagine what the future may hold in these contraptions.

TGB recalls having a conversation with his son and his elderly aunt one June day in New York in 1986. He and his son were discussing computers and software, such as they were at the time. His aunt, recalling the mid-1920s, noted, “Not only did we not have these things, but we could never imagine that such things could even be possible.”

CLIMATE AND SCOTUS

TGB purposely takes a neutral stance on the matter of climate change, or anthropogenic global warming (AGW), as it is sometimes known. For one reason, he has, since the late 1940s, had an interest in paleoclimatology going back to the Archaeologic (now called Archaean) Era. TGB reminds us all that there were multimillion-year intervals during which Earth was warm from pole to pole, even during much of the Tertiary Period of the Cenozoic Era. Then there were ice ages; the four Pleistocene-Epoch ice ages were child’s play compared with those of the Proterozoic and Paleozoic Eras. For example, the Cryogenian Glaciation of the Keweenawan Period (Proterozoic Era, perhaps 800 million years before present) lasted about 175 million years, and perhaps closed out the Proterozoic Era and, indeed, the Cryptozoic Eon. Thereafter came the Cambrian Period (Paleozoic) with its rewarmed Earth and “Species explosion”, by which new living species proliferated in the waters of the time.

But perhaps I digress. Where does SCOTUS come into all this? Well, certain prominent politicians and their staffs have moved to make public expression of doubt about predicted climate change a civil and even perhaps criminal offense under the Racketeer-Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act of 1970, as amended. TGB expects that eventually there will be intense litigation in this regard—indeed, a major petroleum company has come under such threat—and he thinks that eventually such legal action could reach the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) as a First Amendment issue. Given the current and possible future makeup of SCOTUS, TGB hesitates to predict what the outcome of such a SCOTUS litigation would be.

DRUG RESISTANCE AGAIN

Ouch! This is something that TGB feared might happen. It seems that cancer cells, such as those of melanoma and perhaps lung cancer, are developing resistance against immunotherapy drugs, which are considered as cutting-edge therapies against certain cancers (1). It has long been observed that cancer cells can mutate in such ways as to render chemotherapy drugs powerless. Studies in this direction were led by Antoni Ribas and colleagues at the Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center Tumor Immunology Program at the University of California, Los Angeles. They began to get a handle on genetic changes that tumor cells undergo so they can resist the effects of immunotherapy agents. So you see, not only pathogenic bacteria develop such resistance through genetic mutation. So, apparently, do cancer cells and, yes, even fungi and insect pests.

Melanoma cells (2). 

REFERENCES:

1.     McGinley, L. “Study unlocks mechanism of cancer resistance to immunotherapy drugs”. Washington Post, July 14, 2016, p. A9.

2.   Goldsmith, P. https://www.broadinstitute.org/news/4623

MUENCHHAUSEN, Feb. 7, 2016

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT,

RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD

JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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February 7, 2016

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WELCOME!

The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications.

The Green Baron also welcomes comments from anyone who may read Muenchhausen. Please send comments to the e-mail address above.

"SNOWZILLA"
Well, "Snowzilla" is now in the history books. Mrs. TGB and I were snowbound from January 23 to January 28, when our street, driveway, and house access were finally plowed and dug out. Fortunately, we saw it coming well in advance and had ample supplies to ride this thing out. However, a "Snowzilla" or "Snowmageddon" is not an infrequent occurrence. In the Washington, DC area, we get these every several years. TGB can list several recent ones, and he is sure he is forgetting some: 1987, 1993, 1996, 2003, 2010, and now 2016. During this latest one, TGB is grateful that electric power was not lost. He recalls the loss of power for 39 hours during a large fall of heavy, wet snow in February 1987. We were on a well and septic tank system at the time; went on water from the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission (WSSC) in November 1988, well worth the investment and trouble.

"Snowzilla" in TGB's backyard. Photo by TGB.

Dendrobium orchids and "Snowzilla". Photo by TGB

Global warming, anyone? Given "Snowzilla", arguments pro or con? For both sides of the discussion, may TGB remind all that there are, essentially three kinds of lies? One is lies. The second is g-dd---n
lies. And the third is statistics. Or, as another hackneyed old cliché has it, "Figures don't lie, but liars can figure."

PARIS: A BRIEF THOUGHT
Yes, we will get nations to fight climate change and clean their air spaces via shaming and moral suasion, given that COP21 is an agreement and not a treaty. Had it been a treaty, to bind the United States, a favorable ratification vote to two-thirds of Senators present and voting would have been a Constitutional requirement. Currently, such ratification would likely not have been in the cards, given the membership of the Senate. However, TGB believes that COP 21 will essentially be regarded as a treaty, regardless of what the Senate might or might not have done, or what the Constitution provides. In any event, folks in Beijing (and some other Chinese cities) and lately New Delhi will be coughing and wearing face masks from time to time.

MUENCHHAUSEN, Jan. 1, 2016

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT,

RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD

JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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January 1, 2016

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WELCOME!

The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications. 

The Green Baron also welcomes comments from anyone who may read Muenchhausen. Please send comments to the e-mail address above.

HAPPY NEW YEAR (?)

TGB wishes whatever readers he may have a Happy New Year. Please excuse his general pessimism, but given the state of matters in the world today, and as they developed in recent years, TGB questions just how happy, healthy, and prosperous this New Year may turn out to be. Any happiness or lack of may well be reflected in results of the coming general elections to be held, if TGB is correct, on November 8, 2016. Given how things are today, he refuses to guarantee 100% that there indeed will be elections.

COP21

Nothing to do with any police forces. COP21 is the name of the recently concluded climate conference in Paris (ended December 12, 2015, correct?). Given that there are no sanctions involved against those countries that fail to comply with the terms of such agreement as was reached at COP21, perhaps it can be evaluated, generally, as a cipher. Is it possible that its terms can be "enforced" through moral suasion and international public shaming of those nations that do not comply or make a credible effort to do so? Maybe, but TGB would not recommend holding one's breath. Meanwhile, in cities such as Beijing, New Delhi, and Tehran, one might often be doing well by holding one's breath. Given that this is not a viable option, folks in those cities wear face masks and, yes, even purchase cans of air from non-polluted places.

By the way, why was COP21 not carried out as negotiations for a treaty? One possible reason: The US Constitution requires American ratification of an international treaty by two-thirds of members of the US Senate present and voting. Under current circumstances, it is unlikely that such ratification would have been voted.

LESS EFFECTIVE DRUGS

It is becoming evident that drugs being used against many bacterial infections--namely antibiotics--are becoming decreasingly effective. Perhaps future research may uncover ways to combat such microbial resistance to these drugs. The best means for an individual to avoid the need for them is to avoid contracting a bacterial disease if that is at all possible. 

Again, Happy New Year! Sleep well, if you can.

MUENCHHAUSEN, December 21, 2015

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT,

RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD

JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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December 21, 2015

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WELCOME!

The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications.

The Green Baron also welcomes comments from anyone who may read Muenchhausen. Please send comments to the e-mail address above.

WINTER SOLSTICE
Today is the Winter Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere (and Summer Solstice in the Southern). Very interestingly, some nacreous ("mother-of-pearl") and even noctilucent clouds have been spotted in northern Scandinavia where polar night currently prevails. These clouds can float as high as 70,000 feet above mean sea level--so high that they reflect sunlight even at the high latitudes where they are observed. Some scientists say that though noctilucent and nacreous clouds may exhibit a nearly ineffable beauty, they can potentially reduce levels of stratospheric ozone.

Noctilucent clouds over Arctic (1)


CLIMATE--PARIS

The much vaunted Paris climate conference or COP21 lasted from November 30 to December 11. There has been much political-type hoopla about this conclave. What portions of the agreement (?) reached will prove to be binding and observed and by whom is anyone's guess. One can state with complete truth that certain Paris hotels and restaurants did a land-office business. Stories about it that have appeared in the popular press--and TGB has numerous clippings and downloadings--so far leaves him in a quandary. There is, however, much to discuss if one can figure out what actually has been decided or resolved.
Meanwhile, horrific pollution episodes have been taking place in cities as diverse as Beijing, New Delhi, and Tehran.

Air pollution episode in India (2)

BACTERIAL DRUG RESISTANCE
Articles on the growing danger of bacterial resistance to drugs, or "R", are being seen increasingly not only in the popular press, but also in publications aimed at diplomats. TGB has seen stories in publications as diverse as the popular PARADE and the specialized Washington Diplomat. Moreover, "R" in bacteria is rapidly becoming multiple; i.e., a given species of bacteria becomes resistant to more than one class of antibiotics. WASH YOUR HANDS! That's the first line of defense.


REFERENCES
1. NASA. https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1366&bih=637&q=noctilucent+clouds&oq=noctilu&gs_l=img.1.0.0l10.1907.5311.0.10590.8.7.0.1.1.0.160.856.0j7.7.0....0...
1ac.1.64.img..0.8.852.05GFONp9lec#imgrc=LuepM99leFAh4M%3A

2. El Dinamo (Chile). http://www.eldinamo.cl/ambiente/2015/06/05/no-solo-chile-esta-bajo-el-humo-estas-son-las-10-ciudades-mas-contaminadas-del-mundo/

MUENCHHAUSEN, Nov. 28, 2015

MUENCHHAUSEN

AN ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER ABOUT ENVIRONMENT,

RENEWABLE RESOURCE TECHNOLOGY,

AND RELATED TOPICS

By BOOTSTRAP PRESS, INC.

BETHESDA, MD

JJGREENBARON(at)VERIZON.NET

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November 28, 2015

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WELCOME!

The Green Baron (TGB) welcomes one and all who take the time to read Muenchhausen. He aims to “tell it like it is” as much as possible, and avoid advocacy and ideological positions. There are enough of those to go around in other publications.

The Green Baron also welcomes comments from anyone who may read Muenchhausen. Please send comments to the e-mail address above.

PARIS MONDAY
Well, the big international climate conference opens in Paris this Monday--that's November 30, and it lasts until December 11, if all goes according to plan. The United States goes there riding on its moral high horse, being in the process of closing down the coal industry and leading the charge away from (or retreat from?) fossil fuel use. Please don't misunderstand TGB. He is truly all in favor of the use of renewable sources of energy to power the economies of the various nations of the world. May he presume to inquire how such energy is to be accumulated, stored, and distributed to drive our various economies? 

Additionally, with 100+ nations being represented at the Paris conference, including many heads of state of heads of government, will this grand conference be deemed a total success, a partial success, or, effectively, a failure? That remains to be seen and how those who report on it spin their stories. Meanwhile, TGB reads that there has been one of the worst air pollution episodes in Beijing, China, in a long time, and in a city that experiences air pollution incidents frequently (1). Numbers? The US Embassy in Beijing reported particulate matter levels at PM2.5 = 391 micrograms per cubic meter. The World Health Organization places the safe level at 25 micrograms per cubic meter. Reportedly, visibility was reduced to "a few hundred meters" (1). TGB believes that the Chinese delegates to the Paris conference will give strong lip service to reduction of air pollution levels and other environmental problems. Whether and when this lip service will evolve into actual results is what TGB hesitates to speculate.


Cough, cough! (3)

Here's another one from the Financial Times: "India has blocked G20 efforts to pave the way towards an ambitious global climate change accord, in a sign of the deep divisions confronting negotiators just weeks before delegates from nearly 200 nations meet in Paris" (2). This is worth a read if one can read the whole story, which TGB has on a flash drive. Who knows how many other parallel examples there may be, with some hemming and hawing, and "we wholeheartedly support combating climate change, but, ah, we do have certain, er, problems that we need to address first." Well, you get the picture.

And just to add some icing to the cake (and TGB likes icing on cake, take that, Sugar Police!), imagine the security measures that will be taken in Paris, given the events of Friday, Nov. 13! Stay tuned!

REFERENCES
1. Air pollution in Beijing hits hazardous levels". http://www.sfgate.com/news/science/article/Air-pollution-in-Beijing-hits-hazardous-levels-6661328.php, Nov. 28, 2015.
2. Barker, A., Clark, P. "India stance slows progress towards climate change deal". Financial Times, Nov. 17, 2015, p. 6. 
3. http://chinatravelgo.com/travel-air-pollution-in-beijing-and-china/