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Archive for April, 2010
Conference to probe impact of industry on environment
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 9th, 2010
Saudi Gazette: Leading environmentalists from Saudi Arabia, Gulf countries, Asia, the Americas and Europe will meet in a conference on April 18-21 in Manama, Bahrain to discuss the impact of industries on the environment, particularly in the Middle East. The conference, called ENVIROARABIA 2010, is organized by the Environmental Technology and Management Association (ETMA) and the Saudi Arabian Section of the Air and Waste Management Association, both Dhahran-based environmental groups, in ...
Nuclear waste may get a second life
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 9th, 2010
National Public Radio: The Obama administration is promoting nuclear power, but at the same time it has put an end to plans to bury nuclear waste in Yucca Mountain, Nev. Now, a blue-ribbon committee is pondering what to do with the waste. One option under consideration is a process that would dramatically reduce its radioactive lifetime. Less than 1 percent of spent reactor fuel is made up of the nasty radioactive elements that last hundreds of thousands of years. And Sherrell Greene at the ...
Austrian glaciers melting due to warm weather
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 9th, 2010
Associated Press: Experts say that a majority of Austria's glaciers in the Alps are melting due to warm weather. The Austrian Alpine Association says 85 of the 93 glaciers it monitored between the fall of 2008 and the fall of 2009 had receded, while seven stayed the same and one grew. The Innsbruck-based group says in its annual report released Friday that the Niederjochferner glacier in the Oetztal Alps melted the most and shrank by 46 meters (151 feet). It says the average loss among ...
Canada: ‘Make or break’ year for Edmonton’s parched trees
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
Edmonston Journal: A decade-long drought has parched trees and fields across northern Alberta and may be radically reshaping Edmonton's ecology, say forest and climate experts. Environment Canada says each of the past 10 years has been drier than the long-term average in the city. The past two years have been the driest back to back since record-keeping began in the 1880s. Like withdrawals from a chequing account, the city's trees have drained the soil's deep water and depleted their own stores ...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Canada: ‘Make or break’ year for Edmonton’s parched treesGlaciers gone from Glacier National Park
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
Associated Press: Glacier National Park has lost two more of its glaciers to climate change and many of the rest may be gone by the end of the decade, a US government researcher says. Warmer temperatures have reduced the number of named glaciers in the northwestern Montana park to 25, said Dan Fagre said, an ecologist with the US Geological Survey. "When we're measuring glacier margins, by the time we go home the glacier is already smaller than what we've measured," Fagre said on ...
EPA tightens rules on pesticide linked to deaths
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
Associated Press: Thu Apr 8, 6:23 pm ET SALT LAKE CITY -- Federal officials have moved quickly to clamp down on the use of potent rodent-killing pesticides after one was linked to the deaths of two Utah girls earlier this year. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said aluminum and magnesium fumigants can no longer be used near homes. The agency added other regulations about where they can be used outside and what kinds of warnings must be posted when the fumigants are applied. EPA ...
Ice missions to measure climate change takes off
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
Telegraph: The 'ice mission', led by British scientists, will show how melting ice could affect weather patterns in the future in the so called "Day After Tomorrow" scenario. The European Space Agency satellite, that cost £122 million to build, took off on a Russian launcher rocket from Kazakhstan and has already sent signals back to Earth. Duncan Wingham, a climate physicist at University College London, was relieved to see the launch after a previous attempt landed in the sea five years ...
Climate Change Could Destroy Glacier National Park
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
redOrbit: Glacier National Park could lose its namesake ice formations by the end of the decade, an ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) told reporters on Wednesday. In an interview with Matthew Brown of the Associated Press (AP), Dan Fagre noted that the Montana portion has lost two glaciers thanks to global climate change. This brings the number of named glaciers at the park to 25, and due to the increased temperatures in the area, he says, "When we're measuring glacier margins, ...
Clear Water – Mercosur’s Underground Treasure
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
Inter Press Service: Invisible beneath a vast area of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, the Guaraní Aquifer is one of the world's largest reserves of freshwater. Despite supplying water to millions of people, it is neither contaminated nor overexploited. "The general health of the aquifer is good, but it is essential to take care of the areas where it is recharged" in order to prevent contaminants from agrochemicals or waste from human settlements from filtering in, Jorge Santa Cruz, an Argentine ...
Vermont, Quebec groups to study Hydro-Quebec impacts
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 8th, 2010
Associated Press: Environmental groups on both sides of the U.S.-Canadian border are teaming up to study the impacts of the big hydropower developments of the provincial utility Hydro-Quebec. The move comes as Hydro-Quebec has been renewing its courtship of the northeastern United States as a market for its abundance of hydroelectric power, which it describes as a clean alternative to electricity from generators that use fossil fuels like coal. Quebec Premier Jean Charest has been pushing for ...