Daily Briefing: Mon.

DEAL OR NO DEAL: In Singapore on Sunday, President Obama admitted what had become increasingly clear in recent weeks — time has run out to secure a legally binding treaty at next month's U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen. But he was careful to emphasize that all is not lost, endorsing a plan by Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen (right) to make as much headway as possible in Copenhagen and then punt until a second summit down the road, possibly next year in Mexico City. Under Rasmussen's plan, the 192 nations at the Copenhagen talks would essentially draft an incomplete treaty and then fill in the blanks later to make it legally binding. "Given the time factor and the situation of individual countries, we must, in the coming weeks, focus on what is possible and not let ourselves be distracted by what is not," Rasmussen told world leaders in Singapore. "The Copenhagen agreement should finally mandate continued legal negotiations and set a deadline for their conclusion." One potential benefit of waiting could be that it buys the U.S. Senate more time to work out internal differences and pass its own climate bill, which would give American negotiators far more credibility when hashing out a global climate deal. (Sources: New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Guardian)

 

ASH FLOW: Before the year is out, the EPA will decide whether to classify coal ash — a sludgy byproduct of coal-burning — as a hazardous substance, and the agency's decision could have far-reaching ramifications for the U.S. power industry and beyond, the Detroit News reports today. Energy utilities may have to scrap their current method of dumping the slurry into retaining ponds, or at least undertake massive cleanup and retrofitting campaigns, and there's a good chance they'd pass those costs on to their ratepayers. On the other hand, if the EPA opts for a lighter touch or stays out of the issue altogether, it could open the door for companies to build even more coal-fired power plants and store even more coal ash in earthen ponds like ones in Tennessee and Alabama that have breached within the last year. The Tennessee spill has especially become a flashpoint for coal-ash critics, since the 1.1 billion-gallon spill forced families from their homes and spread toxins such as lead, arsenic and mercury over the landscape. With many utilities expecting a tough stance on coal ash, however, environmentalists are warning of a mad dash for permits in the coming weeks. "The power companies know there are regulations coming," a Sierra Club official tells the News. "They are desperately trying to get their coal ash permits approved before new rules are in place." (Source: Detroit News)

 

JELLYFISH ON A ROLL: They're known as "cockroaches of the sea," and swarms of supersized jellyfish are growing even larger and more menacing as Earth heats up, the AP reports. The hardy scavengers benefit from almost anything that hurts other ocean dwellers — sort of bizarro-world canaries in the coal mine — and some scientists are worried climate change could be their key to world domination. Overfishing has already obliterated many of their top predators, and pollution has helped proliferate the plankton they eat, but marine biologists have also begun noticing a strong association between warmer ocean temperatures and exploding jellyfish populations. "It's hard to deny that there is an effect from warming," one scientist tells the AP. "There keeps coming up again and again examples of jellyfish populations being high when it's warmer." In addition to their dangerous stings, swarms of giant jellyfish such as the Nomura are interfering more and more with commercial fishing operations. "Some fishermen have just stopped fishing," says one Japanese fisherman. "When you pull in the nets and see jellyfish, you get depressed." (Source: Associated Press)

 

COLD COMFORT: The H1N1 pandemic is certainly nothing to sneeze at, but it hasn't been nearly as bad as many had feared, especially in France and other parts of Europe. That may be partly due to overblown expectations, but maybe we should also thank another unlikely ally in our fight against swine flu: the common cold. Studies in France and Sweden show that H1N1 rates seem to be rising and falling in negative correlation with the cold — i.e., the more people who catch a cold, the fewer who catch swine flu. That may be due to a process called "viral interference," in which a person catches one virus, the body's antiviral defenses are raised and further infection by other viruses is blocked. We don't normally get a chance to see the cold and the flu duke it out this way because cold rates normally spike in later summer and early fall, while the flu usually hits its stride in winter. But because the pandemic H1N1 came early this year, it was battling against rhinovirus — the culprit behind the cold — for children's noses as soon as school started. (Source: New Scientist)

 

CLAWS AND EFFECT: Several California cities are pushing for local bans on the declawing of house cats, motivated largely by a law that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger passed this summer outlawing such bans, the NY Times reports today. In 2003, West Hollywood became the first U.S. city to take a stand against declawing, and several others have followed suit this fall — Berkeley, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Santa Monica have all passed anti-declawing ordinances since October, while Culver City, Burbank and others are considering their own. This is all in defiance of the new law, which takes effect Jan. 1 and was supported by many veterinarian groups that oppose declawing restrictions. A city councilman in West Hollywood who drafted that city's ban tells the Times that he was inspired to do something out of guilt after he had his own cat's claws removed to save a sofa. He was horrified, he says, to discover that parts of the cat's paw joints were taken out to prevent its claws from growing back. "I didn't realize what I'd done until I saw the pain Alexis went through," he says. "I thought that declawing was glorified nail clipping." (Source: NY Times)

 

— Russell McLendon