Tag Archives: infrastructure

Iconic 100-Year-Old Fishing Shacks Washed Into Sea as Maine High Tide Breaks All-Time Record

“Mother nature isn’t messing around.”

By Jon Queally. Published 1-13-2024 by Common Dreams

*Iconic fishing shacks at Willard Beach in South Portland, Maine were washed into the sea Saturday as the high tide broke an all-time record. (Photo: Shyler Lewis)*

From New York City to the coast of Maine, record-breaking high tides in part fueled by the climate crisis brought destruction to the U.S. northeast on Saturday with roads flooded, infrastructure destroyed, and historic buildings washed out to sea—a horrifying preview of what scientists say will become all the more frequent if humanity continues its refusal to end the era of fossil fuels.

In downtown Portland, Maine the areas along the harbor and waterfront piers were inundated with unprecedented flooding. The city’s vibrant Old Port was underwater in many places with extensive damage to buildings, businesses, and infrastructure.

Continue reading →

Supreme Court Rejects Bid by API, Exxon, and Koch to Kill Climate Case

Leave a reply

“Big Oil companies will continue fighting to escape justice, but for the third time in a year, the U.S. Supreme Court has denied their desperate pleas,” said one campaigner.

By Jessica Corbett. Published 1-8-2024 by Common Dreams

*The Pine Bend oil refinery in Rosemount, Minnesota, run by Flint Hills Resources, a subsidiary of Koch Industries. Photo: Tony Webster/Wikimedia Commons/CC*

For the third time in less than a year, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday allowed a key case against the fossil fuel industry to proceed in state court, delivering a win for the movement to make polluters pay for driving the climate emergency.

“This decision is another step forward for Minnesota’s efforts to hold fossil fuel giants accountable for their climate lies and the harm they’ve caused,” said Center for Climate Integrity president Richard Wiles, pointing to the previous denials of other cases last April and May.

Continue reading →

New Massachusetts ‘Tax the Rich’ Law Raises $1.5 Billion for Free School Lunch and More

Leave a reply

“Taxing the rich, it’s good,” said one progressive advocate in the state.

By Julia Conley. Published 1-2-2024 by Common Dreams

*Photo: U.S. Department of Agriculture*
/flickr/CC

A new “millionaire’s tax” in Massachusetts was expected to generate $1 billion in revenue last year to help pay for public education, infrastructure, and early childcare programs, but projections were a bit off, according to a fresh state analysis.

The state Department of Revenue estimated late last week that the Fair Share Amendment, which requires people with incomes over $1 million, to pay a 4% annual surtax, will add $1.5 billion to state coffers this fiscal year, which ends in June—surpassing expectations.

Continue reading →

Any incident at Ukraine nuclear plant ‘would be deliberate act by Russia’

Leave a reply

Ukrainian nuclear experts say an accident at the Russia-occupied Zaporizhzhia plant would be “almost impossible”

By Kateryna Farbar. Published 6-28-2023 by openDemocracy

The IAEA Support and Assistance Mission to Zaporizhzhya (ISAMZ) arrives at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant i September 2022. Photo: IAEA Imagebank/flickr/CC

An accident at Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant would be “almost impossible” and any damage would be a deliberate act by Russian forces, Ukrainian nuclear personnel have told openDemocracy.

Russia has occupied the plant, in the city of Enerhodar, since the beginning of the full-scale invasion. Its forces are currently preparing to damage the occupied plant, Ukrainian officials claim, in order to stop Ukraine’s counter-offensive in the country’s southeast.

Continue reading →

Tapping Into Warehouse Roof Solar Potential Could Power Entire US Cities

Leave a reply

“If we want to create a clean energy future, we should look first to the already-built environment that could host the tools we need,” said one expert. “Warehouse rooftops provide a perfect opportunity.”

By Kenny Stancil. Published 4-21-2023 by Common Dreams

“The big, flat, and sun-kissed rooftops of America’s warehouses are perfect places to put solar panels,” says one researcher. (Photo: Solect)

Installing solar panels on the roofs of warehouses and distribution centers around the United States could generate enough clean electricity to power every household in every state’s most populous city, according to a report published Thursday by Environment America Research & Policy Center and Frontier Group.

“What the world needs now is rooftop solar, which produces inexpensive clean energy, averts harmful pollution, and preserves open space,” Susan Rakov, chair of Environment America Research & Policy Center’s clean energy program and managing director of Frontier Group, said in a statement.

Continue reading →

Fury Over Privatized Grid Grows as Tens of Thousands Still Without Power in Puerto Rico

Leave a reply

Until the U.S. island’s colonial status “is rectified,” wrote one observer, “it’s a safe bet that Puerto Rico will never fully recover.”

By Kenny Stancil Published 10-6-2022 by Common Dreams

Hurricane Fiona caused an island-wide power outage as it brought dangerous winds and pounding rain to Puerto Rico. Screenshot: WFAA

Frustration with Puerto Rico’s privatized electric grid is mounting, as roughly 82,000 people on the island of 3.2 million still lacked power on Thursday, more than two weeks after Hurricane Fiona plunged the whole U.S. territory into the dark.

Fiona rammed into Puerto Rico on September 18, five years after the much stronger Hurricane Maria triggered an islandwide blackout. In the wake of the 2017 disaster, the island’s grid was completely privatized by LUMA Energy, a joint venture owned by Canadian firm ATCO Ltd. and U.S. contractor Quanta Services Inc. Continue reading →

Intense heat and flooding are wreaking havoc on power and water systems as climate change batters America’s aging infrastructure

Leave a reply

*Volunteers distributed bottled water after Jackson, Mississippi’s water treatment plant failed during flooding in August 2022.*
*Brad Vest/Getty Images*

Paul Chinowsky, University of Colorado Boulder

The 1960s and 1970s were a golden age of infrastructure development in the U.S., with the expansion of the interstate system and widespread construction of new water treatment, wastewater and flood control systems reflecting national priorities in public health and national defense. But infrastructure requires maintenance, and, eventually, it has to be replaced.

That hasn’t been happening in many parts of the country. Increasingly, extreme heat and storms are putting roads, bridges, water systems and other infrastructure under stress. Continue reading →

Political rage: America survived a decade of anger in the 18th century – but can it now?

Leave a reply

*Protesters used violence and intimidation to prevent federal officials from collecting a whiskey tax during George Washington’s presidency.*
*Archive Photos/Getty Images*

Maurizio Valsania, Università di Torino

Americans have an anger problem.

People rage at each other. They are angry at public officials for shutting down parts of society. Or for the opposite reason because they aren’t doing enough to curb the virus. Democrats vent their rage at Republicans. And Republicans treat Democrats not as opponents, but as enemies.

Meanwhile, the American founders are being literally taken off of their pedestals in a rejection of the history they represent. And, of course, a violent mob of Donald Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in early 2021, trying to disrupt that most fundamental of U.S. institutions, the peaceful transfer of presidential power. Continue reading →

A Quarter of All ‘Critical’ US Infrastructure at Risk From Flooding: Report

Leave a reply

“Our nation’s infrastructure is not built to a standard that protects against the level of flood risk we face today, let alone how those risks will grow over the next 30 years as the climate changes,” said one expert.

By Kenny Stancil, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 10-11-2021

Long Island Expressway in New York City shut down due to flash flooding from Post-Tropical Storm Ida’s landfall. Photo: Tommy Gao/Wikimedia Commons/CC

Underscoring the need to slash greenhouse gas emissions and invest in public goods to better prepare communities across the United States for escalating extreme weather, a new report released Monday finds that one-quarter of the nation’s “critical” infrastructure is already susceptible to flooding that renders it inaccessible, with risks projected to increase in the coming decades.

Described as the first-ever nationwide evaluation of community-level vulnerability to flooding, the report—Infrastructure on the Brink, compiled by the First Street Foundation, a nonprofit research group that specializes in environmental risk assessment—highlights localities where housing, commercial real estate, transportation networks, schools, hospitals, power plants, and other pieces of infrastructure face operational flood risk in 2021. Continue reading →

As heat waves intensify, tens of thousands of US classrooms will be too hot for students to learn in

Leave a reply

*Climate change means more schools will need to install or upgrade cooling systems.*
*Bill Uhrich/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images*

Paul Chinowsky, University of Colorado Boulder

Rising temperatures due to climate change are causing more than just uncomfortably hot days across the United States. These high temperatures are placing serious stress on critical infrastructure such as water supplies, airports, roads and bridges.

One category of critical infrastructure being severely affected is the nation’s K-12 schools.

Ideally, the nation’s more than 90,000 public K-12 schools, which serve over 50 million students, should protect children from the sometimes dangerous elements of the outdoors such as severe storms or extreme temperatures. Continue reading →

Occupy World Writes

The Movement Continues – Globally

Tag Archives: infrastructure

Iconic 100-Year-Old Fishing Shacks Washed Into Sea as Maine High Tide Breaks All-Time Record

“Mother nature isn’t messing around.”

Any incident at Ukraine nuclear plant ‘would be deliberate act by Russia’

Ukrainian nuclear experts say an accident at the Russia-occupied Zaporizhzhia plant would be “almost impossible”

Tapping Into Warehouse Roof Solar Potential Could Power Entire US Cities

“If we want to create a clean energy future, we should look first to the already-built environment that could host the tools we need,” said one expert. “Warehouse rooftops provide a perfect opportunity.”

Political rage: America survived a decade of anger in the 18th century – but can it now?

A Quarter of All ‘Critical’ US Infrastructure at Risk From Flooding: Report

“Our nation’s infrastructure is not built to a standard that protects against the level of flood risk we face today, let alone how those risks will grow over the next 30 years as the climate changes,” said one expert.

As heat waves intensify, tens of thousands of US classrooms will be too hot for students to learn in