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Archive for February 4th, 2010
Climate debate needs facts, not anecdotes
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
New Zealand Herald: Anyone who sets out to discredit a piece of published work can do so by finding a single factual error. No matter how peripheral the mistake may be, it undermines public confidence in the work. People naturally wonder, if the authors were careless on this point how much else might be wrong? More than one mistake has been found recently in the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, set up by the United Nations to provide authoritative reports on global warming, ...
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Most of Britain’s ponds in a ‘terrible state’
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
Telegraph: The Centre for Ecology and Hydrology measured animal life and water quality in half a million ponds across the country, from tarns in the Lake District to garden pools. Mostly as a result of pollution from farms, sewers and roads, more than 80 per cent of ponds were judged to be in a "poor" or "very poor state". Invasive species like water primrose and the paving over of more gardens is also a problem. As a consequence rare species of frogs, dragonflies and aquatic ...
Research links water vapour and climate change
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
Australian Broadcasting Corporation: ELEANOR HALL: The Federal Government might be shaping its climate change policy around reducing carbon dioxide emissions but research from the US Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has found an increase in stratospheric water vapour may be responsible for nearly a third of the global warming that took place during the 1990s. It also found that a 10 per cent drop in vapour slowed down the rate of global warming by a quarter over the last decade. Timothy McDonald spoke about ...
How spider webs catch water drops
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
BBC: The new study has shown how spider silk captures water from the air and gathers it into jewel-like droplets. As well probing the science of this natural phenomenon, the researchers went on to design a new material with similar properties to the spider silk. They report in the journal Nature that copying spider silk could lead to the development of more "smart materials". Such materials could eventually be used as catalysts or filters to draw substances out of chemical ...
Pachauri admits damage to UN climate change panel
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
Australian: The embattled chief of the UN climate change panel has admitted that a mistake in a landmark 2007 report has damaged the body's credibility. But Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, refused to apologise for the erroneous claim that global warming could melt Himalayan glaciers by 2035. The admission came as former British chief scientist David King backed away from his sensational claim that a foreign intelligence agency or wealthy US ...
UN official says climate change science robust despite errors in panel report
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
Canadian Press: Errors in an authoritative report about the impact of global warming on Himalayan glaciers should not detract from the overall conclusions drawn in the study, the U.N. climate chief said Thursday. Yvo de Boer acknowledged that some mistakes were made in the 2007 report by the U.N.-affiliated Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change but argued that the science behind global warming was robust and that the report itself was helping countries combat it. The IPCC report warning ...
Uganda: Uncertain future ahead as wetland destruction speeds global warming
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
Daily Monitor: Environmentalists have raised an alarm over the rapid destruction of wetlands and warned of dire consequences if immediate action is not taken to arrest the situation. Particular concern has been raised over rapid depletion of the eco-system around Lakes Victoria and Kyoga which have lost a significant portion of the wetlands around them that act at natural purifiers and breeding ground for fish. Nationwide, wetland cover has drastically reduced from about 37,575 square ...
Is there enough food out there for nine billion people?
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 4th, 2010
New Republic: Sometime around 2050, there are going to be nine billion people roaming this planet--two billion more than there are today. It's a safe bet that all those folks will want to eat. And that's... an incredibly daunting prospect. Right now, an estimated one billion people go hungry each day. So add two billion more people, a limited supply of arable land, plus the fact that rising incomes will boost demand for meat and dairy products, plus the fact that many key natural resources (fisheries, ...