ENVIRONMENTAL HEADLINES, July 29 – August 4
RAIL-ON-RICHMOND DEBATE BUILDS STEAM FOR A FINAL PUSH
Houston Chronicle 7/31/06
With Metro staff set to recommend a University light rail route Monday and US Rep. John Culberson announcing his stance on the issue today, both sides in the rail-on-Richmond debate are building up steam for a final push.
RAIL PLAN ROLLS ON DESPITE LAWMAKER’S OBJECTION
RIVER OAKS THEATER SUPPORTERS TURN TO CITY COUNCIL
Houston Chronicle 8/2/06
The growing movement to save three art-deco landmarks, including the Landmark River Oaks Theatre, shifted Tuesday to the Houston City Council, where a dozen Houstonians including filmmakers, a real-estate investor, a fifth-grade teacher, and society fundraiser Carolyn Farb urged the council to change preservation laws.
THOUSANDS JOIN FIGHT FOR RIVER OAKS CENTER
TASK FORCE GIVES MAYOR WHITE IDEAS TO SAVE HISTORIC SITES
OIL EXECS SPEAK ON TRANSFORMED ENERGY INDUSTRY
Houston Chronicle 7/31/06
High prices, war in the Middle East and global warming concerns have transformed energy from a dull industry taken for granted by many Americans into a top-of-the-mind pocketbook issue for consumers.
SENATE APPROVES MORE OFFSHORE DRILLING IN GULF, SETS UP CONFRONTATION WITH HOUSE
Environmental News Network 8/2/06
WASHINGTON The Senate voted Tuesday to open 8.3 million acres of federal waters in the central Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas drilling, setting up a confrontation with the House which wants even more drilling in waters now off-limits.
TEXAS WOULD BENEFIT FROM SENATE DRILLING MEASURE
FEDS EYEING FREEPORT FOR OIL STORAGE FACILITY
Houston Chronicle 8/3/06
A war has quietly raged for the past year over a salt dome near Freeport, with the city and a major area employer, Dow Chemical, fighting to keep the feds out.
EXXON MOBIL LOSES APPRAISAL CHALLENGE
Baytown Sun 7/30/06
An appraisal review board panel ruled the property value of the Exxon Mobil Baytown Refinery is nearly $1 billion more than the company believes.
SUBSIDIES FUEL PUSH FOR NUCLEAR ENERGY
Galveston County Daily News 7/30/06
Rather than reopening a local plant that sits idle, NRG Energy plans to build two reactors elsewhere in Texas.
DATA LINKING BAD STORMS, GLOBAL WARMING CALLED INCONCLUSIVE
Houston Chronicle 7/31/06
MIAMI — Officials tracking the approach of the peak hurricane season told President Bush today that data linking a series of devastating storms to global warming was inconclusive.
MAJOR WORLD CITIES TEAM UP TO FIGHT GLOBAL WARMING
Reuters 8/2/06
LOS ANGELES – Los Angeles, London, New York, Seoul, and 18 other cities joined forces on Tuesday in a global warming project aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
TO PRESERVE WATER, TEXANS MIND SPIGOTS
Houston Chronicle 8/2/06
More than 21,000 people who live near the banks of the Trinity River, a short hop from the northern tip of Lake Livingston and about 80 miles from Houston, see plentiful water all around them, except in their own supplies.
HEALTH DISTRICT WARNS OF BACTERIA IN WATER
Galveston County Daily News 7/28/06
GALVESTON Recent rains have washed animal feces and other waste into the waters surrounding the island and the Bolivar Peninsula.
BEACH WATCH WARNS OF BACTERIA DANGERS
DALLAS PET CLEANUP FRANCHISE SCOOPS UP HOUSTON AS EXPANSION MARKET
RECYCLING SINGLE-USE MEDICAL DEVICES SAVES MONEY, RAISES CONCERNS
Environmental News Network 7/31/06
TRENTON, N.J. For eight months during his infancy, Sean Van Duyn gagged, retched, and vomited daily. Now 6, the Winter Haven, Fla., boy still can’t eat or drink by mouth, instead being fed by a permanent tube in his belly.
HOUSTON SKY NO LIMIT FOR PROLIFIC ARCHITECT
Houston Chronicle 8/1/06
Seth Irvin Morris, whose architectural firm left a timeless imprint on the Houston skyline from the first-of-its-kind Astrodome to downtown’s trapezoidal Pennzoil Place skyscraper to the Williams Tower that looms high over the Galleria died early Tuesday of pneumonia. He was 91.
FIND WEATHER BALLOON BOX AND EARN A REWARD OF $30
Houston Chronicle 7/31/06
Beginning today, Houston-area scientists will launch up to a dozen weather balloons a day to study local air quality, and they need your help.