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Archive for April 1st, 2010
ALERT! Resistance Growing to Ecologically Devastating Chinese Mining Invasion of Madang, Papua New Guinea
Posted by Water Conservation Blog on April 1st, 2010
TAKE ACTION HERE NOW!
Chinese government owned China Metallurgical Construction (MCC) corporation's efforts to establish the massively destructive Ramu Nickel mine in Madang Province [search], Papua New Guinea the largest investment in metal exploration and mining by the Chinese outside of China is in serious jeopardy. Local landowners are successfully initiating court cases and protests to demand mine tailings not be dumped into the sea poisoning fish stocks and causing extreme ecological destruction or the mine be stopped. The entire project has been mismanaged, marked by shoddy construction; and disregard for local rights, life, and marine and rainforest ecology. Chinese mining investment in Madang against local wishes can only be described as an invasion of sovereign peoples, and will be resisted at all costs.
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Comments Off on ALERT! Resistance Growing to Ecologically Devastating Chinese Mining Invasion of Madang, Papua New GuineaPlan to chop down forests in England
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
Telegraph: The new policy to convert forests to 'open habitat' will increase the area of heathland across England by 1,000 hectares (2,470 acres) every year for at least the next five years. This will mean chopping down thousands of hectares of mostly commercial conifers to allow rare animals like sand lizards, adder, woodlark and curlew to return. It is estimated that 80 per cent of lowland heathland has been lost in the past 200 years to plantation forestry, agriculture and housing ...
Ice plumbing is protecting Greenland from warm summers
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
New Scientist: IF SOME of the spectacular calving of ice shelves in Antarctica is down to global warming, then why did we not see break-ups on the same scale in Greenland, which is much warmer? It turns out that, counter-intuitively, it's because Greenland is warmer. When the ice sheets that blanket Antarctica and Greenland eventually meet the sea, they don't immediately calve off and create icebergs. Instead, they extend out to sea as floating ice shelves while remaining joined to the ice sheets on ...
Arab states urged to be open on water scarcity
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
Reuters: People in the Arab world need fuller and freer information about shrinking water supplies but their governments are withholding it for fear of fuelling unrest, a United Nations expert said on Thursday. Arable land makes up just 4.2 percent of the Middle East and North Africa and is expected to shrink due to climate change -- a potential source of political instability, analysts say, in a region where economic privation has sometimes sparked conflict. "Arab countries do not ...
EPA: New mining policy would protect water quality
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
Associated Press: The Obama administration Thursday spelled out tighter water quality standards for surface coal mines in Appalachia in a move that could curtail mountaintop removal mining. The policy will sharply reduce the practice of filling valleys with waste from mountaintop removal and other types of surface mines in a six-state region, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson said. The policy met with immediate praise from opponents who consider mountaintop mining ...
James Cameron, in real life, fights to save indigenous groups from massive dam construction in Brazil
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
Mongabay: After creating a hugely successful science-fiction film about a mega-corporation destroying the indigenous culture of another planet, James Cameron has become a surprisingly noteworthy voice on environmental issues, especially those dealing with the very non-fantastical situation of indigenous cultures fighting exploitation. This week Cameron traveled to Brazil for a three-day visit to the Big Bend (Volta Grande) region of the Xingu River to see the people and rainforests that would ...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on James Cameron, in real life, fights to save indigenous groups from massive dam construction in BrazilDesert spreading like ‘cancer,’ Egypt conference told
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
Agence France-Presse: The desert is making a comeback in the Middle East, with fertile lands turning into barren wastes that could further destabilise the region, experts said at a water conference on Thursday. "Desertification spreads like cancer, it can't be noticed immediately," said Wadid Erian, a soil expert with the Arab League, at a conference on Thursday in the Egyptian coastal town of Alexandria. Its effect can be seen in Syria, where drought has displaced hundreds of thousands of people, ...
Mobile phone barcode app to help ethical shoppers
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 1st, 2010
Guardian: An innovative mobile phone app could create a new generation of ethical shoppers by allowing them to check a company's social responsibility rating and environmental credentials. Barcoo, developed by a group of young Germans, allows customers to point their phones at the barcode on products in shops and find out information such as how environmentally friendly a company is and even how it treats its staff. Its makers say the app is intended to motivate the world to shop more ...