Shell's head of Alaskan exploration faces the press. (Photo by Fabio DiLupo.)

How about a quick update on Shell's puttering about in the Arctic? You may remember that it's trying to create a conduit comprised of a little bit of metal and some concrete that runs from the ocean surface directly into a large pocket of oil. This is a cause for concern to many people, although, in fairness, it has been months since there was a malfunction at an offshore rig that caused oil to spew into the ocean.

Shell's progress has been slow, something it blames on basically everyone and everything: the air, the ice, the Department of the Interior. The one of those things that is capable of responding did.

“The cause for any delay here is Shell’s construction of its vessel,” [Interior Secretary Ken] Salazar said. “They have not been able to get it done. If they had got it done, they may already be up there today, because the waters in the Chukchi [Sea] around the so-called Burger find are already open.”

“It’s not a matter of ice, it’s a matter of whether Shell has the mechanical capability to comply with the exploration (plan) that had been approved,” Salazar added.

No offense to the good people at Shell, but Salazar may have a point. I mean, the company can't even get the order of things right. See, first you're supposed to drill the well and then you're supposed to pollute the water. Shell got it backward.

All filled up, no place to go.

Plans for a massive coal export terminal in Grays Harbor, Wash., have been scrapped.

RailAmerica has abandoned any current plans to construct a coal storage and export facility at the Port of Grays Harbor’s Terminal 3 in Hoquiam.

Port Commissioners on Tuesday were told the company has completed an evaluation of the site and that it would no longer be exercising an agreement giving it access to study the potential for a coal terminal, although the rail company still plans to partner with the Port on future projects. ...

RailAmerica had said it was interested in possibly shipping 5 million tons of coal annually from the Powder River Basin of Montana, Wyoming, and the Dakotas, primarily overseas to China. Documents turned over by the Port of Grays Harbor as part of a Daily World public records request showed that RailAmerica first approached the Port about a coal terminal in the spring of 2010.

The port at Grays Harbor was one of several along the West Coast where coal export terminals have been proposed. As David Roberts noted in May, local economies don't see much benefit from expanding harbors to facilitate coal export.

Cliff Stearns in happier times. (Photo from Wikipedia.)

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) has had a good run over the course of his 23 years on Capitol Hill. He's led the charge on important issues, such as the huge Solyndra scandal (not a scandal) and having an opinion on abortion.

But all good things must come to an end. In a primary yesterday, Stearns apparently lost his seat in a squeaker to Ted Yoho, a Tea Party veterinarian* who ran this ad:

(At this point, I can reveal that the choice of "squeaker" above was intentional.)

It's not final; Yoho leads by only 829 votes. [Wait, it is final. See update below.] But either way, Politico suggests that the vote is "an unexpected rebuke" for Stearns, who outraised Yoho 16-to-1.

Brown's inauguration in 1975. (Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.)

The last time he was governor of California, Jerry Brown was dubbed "Governor Moonbeam." It was the '70s, after all, and California continued to live up to its bohemian reputation. The "Moonbeam" moniker came from a columnist in Chicago who found one of Brown's proposals too wacky to believe: using space-based satellites to facilitate emergency communications. In other words, the progenitor of how your cell phone works.

It will be interesting to see what Brown is called after his latest idea:

While the governor is in Lake Tahoe for an annual interstate summit, his office unveiled a new Web page: “Climate change: Just the facts.” The text on the page has the ring of Brown himself in its spirited defense of science and harsh critique for those who deny the impacts of global climate change. …

The page comes complete with footnotes and graphs, citing such sources as European health journals and tobacco documents from the 1960s.

“After decades of pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, humanity is getting dangerously close to the point of no return,” Brown said in a statement. “Those who still deny global warming’s existence should wake up and honestly face the facts.”

The page in question is here, part of the governor's Office of Planning and Research. That makes sense, as a governor ought to prepare for -- or, ideally, prevent -- the worst impacts of climate change, which Brown's office describes as "sea level rise, more frequent and hotter heat waves, a declining water supply and large, intense wildfires.”

North Dakota's Department of Mineral Resources today released the state's monthly oil production statistics [PDF]. This is what the boom looks like, stretching back to April 1951 when the first well was built.

Barrels of oil is indicated on the left axis; number of wells, the right. Click to embiggen.

Since 2000, production has really exploded. (So to speak.) Here's just the last 12 years.

Same scale as above. Click to embiggen.

This dog is not registered to vote.

Believe it or not, politicians can mention the fact that the health of the planet is being slowly eroded due to carbon pollution and they won't immediately be impeached.

Kind of a surprise, right? Especially if the only evidence you have at hand is how willing elected officials are to discuss climate change. From the available evidence, it seems that members of Congress would rather talk about their sympathy for Al Qaeda than suggest that maybe we should take common-sense steps toward not ruining the climate.

They don't need to be so skittish. According to the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication, advocating for action on climate change is a net benefit for political candidates. Some toplines from a poll the group released today [PDF]:

• A majority of all registered voters (55%) say they will consider candidates' views on global warming when deciding how to vote.
• Among these climate change issue voters, large majorities believe global warming is happening and support action by the U.S. to reduce global warming, even if it has economic costs.
• Independents lean toward “climate action” and look more like Democrats than Republicans on the issue.
• A pro-climate action position wins votes among Democrats and Independents, and has little negative impact with Republican voters.

This is generally good news -- but it seems hard to believe that this will inspire any Republican candidates to pick up the mantle, or encourage any Democrats to invoke the wrath of climate deniers. One of the missing factors in this poll (based on my read-through; happy to be corrected) is an assessment of the virulence of the belief. Climate deniers are far more vocal than proponents for action. This has been part of the problem: There's a much higher political cost paid when opposing deniers than supporters, even though the latter are the majority.

Yesterday, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation released its annual report articulating the states with the highest obesity rates in the nation. Winning the dubious distinction of first place: Mississippi.

The analysis used the state obesity rates released today by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Mississippi had the highest rate of obesity at 34.9 percent, while Colorado had the lowest rate at 20.7 percent. Twenty-six of the 30 states with the highest obesity rates are in the Midwest and South.

Grim, to be sure.

Our contribution to this depressing bit of news? This interactive map.

The two presidential campaigns are now operating as weird reflections of each other. Each is criticizing the other for killing energy jobs; each is claiming to be an industry's salvation. It's basically the same strategy, but Romney says "coal" while Obama says "wind."

Photo by Hepburn Wind.

This afternoon, Mitt Romney heads to Ohio, where he'll attend a "coal event" in a small town near the West Virginia border. Romney's goal is to leverage the "war on coal" rhetoric that's dragging down the president's popularity in the region.

As Cincinnati.com notes, the optics of Romney's trip today may be tricky.

Romney will be at American Energy. A sister company within parent Murray Energy Corp. pleaded guilty last month for a pipeline rupture at a coal preparation plant near Beallsville that spilled thousands of gallons of slurry into pristine Captina Creek, turning the stream black for 22 miles. Ohio Valley Coal Co. pleaded guilty last month in federal district court to criminal violations of the federal Clean Water Act. The spill is costing the company millions.

Murray Energy is the largest privately held coal company in the nation, according to its website. An accident at its Century Mine in Beallsville on Aug. 8, 2011 killed a worker.

So why the visit? Why let Murray "[bus] in employees and their families for the rally in support of Romney"? Perhaps this CNN interview with Robert Murray, CEO of Murray Energy, explains.

If you're familiar with the name Enbridge, it's probably because of the company's stellar track record of spilling oil all over Michigan and then spilling a bit less oil all over Wisconsin. It's like a vaudeville skit, something out of Laurel and Hardy -- a clumsy buffoon slipping and sliding all over the stage, oil pouring from his pants pockets and from under his hat.

Standard revolutionary fare in opposition to a new Enbridge pipeline. (Photo by jennzebel.)

Enbridge is currently "managed" by a guy named Patrick Daniel, continuing the new trend of dudes only having first names. Patrick Daniel (whose name I just accidentally typed as "Denial" -- seriously -- and then thought about whether I should change it) went on the radio in Canada yesterday and said the following things, according to the Edmonton Journal. His goal was to get people to like this idea he has for a new pipeline to take tar-sands oil from Alberta to British Columbia. He was maybe not so successful.

He said:

Everything that we say sounds defensive and self-interested, and on the other side, everything they say ... is really taken as gospel -- and it isn’t.

Shorter version: "Just because we lie, people don't like us."

Setting aside the irony of claiming that science is "taken as gospel," the debate isn't between oil-lovers and oil-haters. It's between people who make money by polluting and people who would like to curtail that pollution. It's between an industry that seeks to obscure the truth and a movement that wants to clarify. By the way, dude -- you sound defensive.

A subtle reminder that the environment in California is generally nice.

The long run-up to California's cap-and-trade program will finally end this November, as the state launches its market for carbon allowances. Polluters will buy allowances for each ton of carbon dioxide they produce on an open market. Producing more will therefore cost a company more; producing less will yield a cost savings. The system is intended not only to impose a cost on the pollution, but also to bring down the total amount of pollution.

From Bloomberg:

The [California Air Resources Board] is on schedule to develop a platform for a Nov. 14 auction of allowances, each allowing for the release of one metric ton of carbon under a state program that caps emissions from plants beginning next year, Chairman Mary Nichols said during an interview at Bloomberg’s San Francisco office. ...

Allowances to be used as part of the state’s program are commanding higher prices than any other carbon permits traded on futures exchanges as regulators develop rules for a system that eventually will cover 85 percent of the greenhouse gases released in the state. It would become the first economy-wide program of its kind in the U.S.