The Halifax Examiner yesterday featured an op-ed piece by Thomas J. Duck, professor of Physics and Atmospheric Science at Dalhousie, about the province's controversial fracking review panel. Publisher Tim Bousquet promo-ed the piece with the headline, "Climate change: the elephant in the room during fracking debate." Unfortunately, Duck's piece is behind the Examiner's paywall—no complaint implied; even journalists are entitled to make a living—but [Duck's piece has is no longer behind a paywall] I don't feel the piece, which devoted only one of its 12 paragraphs to climate change, lived up to the headline. Here is a response I posted on the Examiner's provocative website. I was hoping this...

06 August, 2014

Last week, I decried HRM council's decision to reject a staff-recommended plan to replace The Ugliest Building Cobb Ever Designed with a new four-pad rink, and instead vote to spend two-and-a-half times as much money for 25 percent less rink. Waye Mason, the excellent councillor who moved the motion to save TUBCED, aka The Halifax Forum, responds. First the math: $45 million gets you four rinks at DND lands. DND gets one and Halifax gets three, so Halifax pays 75%, which is $33.75 million. The lower figure you cite assumes the Forum lands sell for $18 million and all that money goes against the construction cost,...

06 August, 2014

Aaron Beswick of the Chronicle-Herald yesterday confirmed a rumour I heard late last week:  even as it spews unusually thick clouds of noxious fumes over the Town of Pictou, the Northern Pulp mill has been running flat-out. Northern Pulp’s top five most productive days since opening 57 years ago were all this year. It set two production records in July alone, producing 979 air-dried tonnes of kraft pulp on July 17 and 972.9 on July 15, according to documents obtained by The Chronicle Herald. Those records were set a month after a leak that sent untreated effluent into Pictou Harbour and just before a campaign by Pictou County...

06 August, 2014

Earlier today, former Finance Minister Graham Steele voiced appreciation for CBU President David Wheeler's thoughtful comments about the all-too-common incivility of public discourse in Nova Scotia. "[I]magine you are a politician," wrote Steele, "facing this level of incivility and mudslinging, day after day, on issue after issue...

05 August, 2014

Fed by the Rio Grande, Elephant Butte Reservoir in New Mexico drains 74,850 square km, almost half again the area of Nova Scotia. When full, it holds 2,065,010 acre-feet, or 2.55 cubic kilometres of water. It was at or near capacity for most of the the period from 1985 to 2000, but last summer, it dwindled to its lowest level in 41 years. The image on the left, taken June 2, 1994, show it about 89 percent full. At right, July 8, 20134, it was down to about 3 percent of its capacity. The paired photos are from a series of NASA images showing changes in the earth's surface. Many...

05 August, 2014

Shift change at the Kéréon lighthouse, on Snapping Stone Reef (récif de Men Tensel), Breton, France. In Brittany, an isolated, sea-bound lighthouse is called a ‘Hell.’ Le Kéréon was the last French hell to be automated, in January, 2004. Not sure why there is a shift change at an automated lighthouse. Maybe Paul Cranford will know.  H/T: Jim Prime...

05 August, 2014

Former Cape Bretoner Peter Kavanagh writes from Toronto: I have been following the back and forth here and on various sites with some keen interest. As to Wheeler's last paragraph and his concern that in Nova Scotia, "we cannot seem to come to terms with civil discourse about important topics," I feel compelled to say, welcome to the club. This is by no means a Nova Scotian problem. I think it's an environmentalist problem. Perhaps because of the movement's history of civil disobedience—sometimes admirable, sometimes repellant—advocates too often fall into the lazy substitution of catcalls and personal attacks for the hard work of research, coalition building, and...

05 August, 2014

David Wheeler, president of Cape Breton University and unpaid chair of the independent panel reviewing fracking in Nova Scotia, has responded to yesterday's Contrarian post about a west coast journal's attack on his objectivity. In my view, his position doesn't need much of a defence,; Andrew Nikiforuk's original attack was pretty thin gruel. But his last paragraph below highlights an existential crisis in the environmental movement. We have never needed a strong environmental movement more than we do today. The dire consequences of climate change are bearing down upon us, while too many politicians and business leaders find it expedient to deny the problem or put off action...

04 August, 2014

In response to this post on soccer's unexpected-by-the-sports-establishment popularity in North America, and this John Cleese rant, Contrarian reader Merrill Smith thinks we're missing the point: Could it be that Ann Coulter has a sense of humour? I would never have thought so, but the piece you linked to read like genuine sarcasm. I think it was funnier than the John Cleese clip. And I find myself on her side of this argument. I have tried to like soccer. When I went to England long ago, I adopted Man U because Bobby Charlton was the only player I had ever heard of. I...

03 August, 2014

Andrew Nikiforuk. a respected journalist-critic of the petroleum industry, yesterday attacked David Wheeler, president of Cape Breton University and head of Nova Scotia's independent fracking review panel, for failing to disclose what he called close ties "to a company that trains oil and gas workers for Exxon Mobil, a key promoter of hydraulic fracturing and one of the world's largest energy companies." His critique appeared on TheTyee.ca website. Although the Nova Scotia Hydraulic Fracturing Review Panel describes David Wheeler as the president and vice-chancellor of Cape Breton University, it makes no mention of his public responsibilities with LearnCorp International. Nor does it...

03 August, 2014
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