A group of local leaders touted New Mexico’s work towards addressing climate change during a recent webinar on public health and climate change. But speakers such as Speaker of the House Brian Egolf, a Santa Fe Democrat, and New Mexico Department of Health (DOH) Sec. Kathyleen Kunkel tip-toed around the state’s recent record oil production and its contribution to climate change.

Fossil fuel combustion is the chief driver of carbon dioxide emissions that are causing climate change. While many states have begun transitioning to renewable energy sources to replace coal, oil and natural gas, New Mexico is the only state to adopt a 100 percent clean energy mandate while also producing...

Whistleblower’s grievance reveals LANL tritium release over legal limit

SANTA FE —The New Mexico Environmental Law Center and Nuclear Watch New Mexico notified the Environmental Protection Agency Aug. 28 that its rubber stamping of plans by the Department of Energy and the Los Alamos National Laboratory to vent up to 114,000 curies of radioactive gaseous tritium is unacceptable.

The two organizations stated:

“We believe that EPA and DOE, as federal agencies mandated to serve and protect the public, need to entirely reconsider their decision to allow this tritium venting project to move forward. The venting project has been poorly thought out; it would put an inestimable number...

Week ending Friday, September 4, 2020

Wounded Ice

This summer’s record heat around icy areas of the Northern Hemisphere has left a “deep wound” in the planet’s cryosphere, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) says.

It said the damage to the icy landscape came amid record Arctic heat, dwindling polar sea ice and the fracturing of what had been Canada’s last fully intact ice shelf.

WMO spokeswoman Clare Nullis  called the Arctic heating at twice the global warming average a “vicious circle” that influences warming elsewhere.

“The rapid decline of sea ice in turn contributes to more warming, and so the circle goes on and the consequences do not stay in the...

COVID-19 pushes cancer activists to create new fundraiser

Last year’s Relay For Life has been transformed into a Luminaria Lights of Hope & Love Evening by volunteers working to raise money for the American Cancer Society – Cancer Action Network).

Due to changes caused by COVID-19, the 2020 version of the Relay For Life will be held Sept. 12 from 8 pm-9:30 pm with the luminarias for the relay set up on the 400 block of Logan (in the space of the former Roosevelt Elementary School).

People can drive by and purchase a bag from their car or make a donation.

Last year, on June 19 the Relay For Life 20th Anniversary was celebrated at Courthouse Square, under the banner, “We’re...