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Archive for June, 2010
United Kingdom: Heat wave prompts utilities to call for help tackling water shortages
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 24th, 2010
Business Green: As the UK gears up for a predicted summer heat wave after the driest start to a year since 1976, water firms are urging businesses to save water and reduce the risk of future restrictions. United Utilities stepped up preparations for water shortages in North West England today by applying for a drought permit, and warned customers that a hosepipe ban is likely if the dry spell continues next month. A spokesman for the company told BusinessGreen.com that the firm was calling on ...
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The Science Behind Deepwater Oil Drilling
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 24th, 2010
National Public Radio: April's Deepwater Horizon disaster has continued to raise questions about the oil industry's ability to manage the challenges and risks involved in drilling miles below the ocean floor to reach highly pressurized oil deposits. Science reporter Henry Fountain has been covering the environmental disaster for The New York Times. In an interview with Fresh Air's Dave Davies, Fountain explains how deepwater drilling works thousands of feet below sea level and what may have gone wrong on ...
Asian Carp Found Near Great Lakes
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 24th, 2010
New York Times: After months of worrying over hints and signs and DNA traces suggesting that Asian carp, a voracious, nonnative fish, might be moving perilously close to the Great Lakes, the authorities here have uncovered the proof they did not want. They caught a fish. An Asian bighead carp like these in an aquarium made it past a fence designed to keep it out of the Great Lakes. One bighead carp -- a 19.6-pound, 34.6-inch male -- became entangled Tuesday in a fishing net about six miles ...
Shoddy parts trip up major North Sea wind farm
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
Spiegel: Unforeseen problems at the Alpha Ventus wind farm have lukewarm investors reevaluating the billions of euros they have invested in offshore wind energy. Germany's first offshore wind park was dealt a blow with the failure of two turbines due to inferior materials. The rough patch has energy executives scurrying to reassure Berlin and banks scrutinizing their billions in offshore wind energy investments. Less than two months after celebrating its opening, the Alpha Ventus test ...
iPhone 4 and Apple’s silence on pollution in China
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
Guardian: Announcing the iPhone4 at the WWDC conference earlier this month, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said, "it's a major jump from the original models. This is undoubtedly the most beautiful and sophisticated product I have created." However in sharp contrast with this high-profile release, Apple has been silent about questions regarding their supply chain's heavy metal pollution. On April 16, 2010, 34 Chinese environmental organizations, including Friends of Nature, the Institute of Public and ...
Gulf property sales slide further on oil fears
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
Associated Press: This was the year, Alicia Hollis and her fellow real estate agents thought. After a nasty batch of hurricanes and the bursting of the housing bubble, this was the year that condo sales along the Florida Panhandle's brilliant white beaches were going to rebound. Then came the oil -- or more accurately, the mere threat of oil. Though most of the Gulf Coast remains free of tar balls, sheen and sludge from the spill in the Gulf of Mexico, owners and agents say the disaster has ...
U.S. Halts Use of Beetle to Attack Tamarisk
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
New York Times: Got an alien invader plant species? Unleash an alien insect invader to fight back. One invader eats the other, and then abracadabra: problem solved. That was the theory, anyway. But the United States Department of Agriculture this month quietly ended its involvement in a five-year-old program intended to reduce an invasive alien tree species in the West -- the saltcedar, or tamarisk -- using an equally alien invasive beetle from Kazakhstan, the saltcedar leaf beetle, which loves to ...
United States: Where Thoreau Lived, Crusade Over Bottles
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
New York Times: Henry David Thoreau was jailed here 164 years ago for refusing to pay taxes while living at Walden Pond. Now the town has Jean Hill to contend with. Jean Hill has proposed a ban on the sale of bottled water in Concord, which will be reviewed by the state attorney general and could go into effect next January. Mrs. Hill, an octogenarian previously best known for her blueberry jam, proposed banning the sale of bottled water here at a town meeting this spring. Voters approved, ...
Fierce Recycling Effort in Fighting Oil’s Spread
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
New York Times: Pete Parker's not-so-small frame radiates purpose. Striding around a dockside yard where his "decontamination unit' works, he keeps an eye on 11 workers who are stooped over drills, bolts and iron mallets to repair oil-containment booms damaged by waves and strong currents in the gulf. Pete Parker, center, leads the unit that works on the Gulf Coast to make damaged oil-containment booms seaworthy again. Like a cobbler in a town where no new shoes are to be had, Mr. Parker, 60, ...
United Kingdom: Hydropower schemes surge in decade, Environment Agency figures show
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 23rd, 2010
Press Association: The number of small-scale hydropower schemes to generate energy from rivers in England and Wales has surged in the last decade, figures from the Environment Agency showed today. The number of new licences issued by the government agency for hydropower schemes has increased sixfold since 2000. Last year, 31 new licences for energy schemes in rivers were granted – compared with just five in 2000. The Environment Agency has already issued 29 licences this year and is ...