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Archive for August 17th, 2010
Satellite tracks Pakistan floods
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
BBC: The Smos spacecraft senses the wetness of soils, and its unique instrument has detailed how the earth became saturated in the monsoon rains. The floods, which began more than two weeks ago in the mountainous northwest, are the worst in recorded history. Some 20 million people and 160,000 sq km of land - a fifth of the country - have been affected by the disaster. Data from the European Space Agency's new Smos satellite has been processed to make a series of ...
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Imran Khan launches Pakistan floods appeal
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Guardian: Imran Khan, the cricketer-turned-politician, is launching his own emergency fundraising appeal for the victims of the devastating floods in Pakistan, pitting him directly against the government's own efforts. The Imran Khan Flood Relief organisation will seek to tackle both the immediate emergency and the long-term rehabilitation work required. "The government has totally collapsed, there's no government here," Khan told the Guardian. "The government's efforts to raise money have ...
Extreme weather unlikely to help climate talks
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Reuters: Extreme weather in 2010 will spur more strident calls for action to combat global warming but is unlikely to break a deadlock at UN climate talks about sharing the burden between rich and poor. Pakistan, for instance, has blamed mankind's emissions of greenhouse gases for devastating floods that have killed up to 1,600 people. And Russian President Dmitry Medvedev similarly directly linked the summer heat wave on global warming. But there is no sign so far that major emitters ...
Weather Extremes and Climate Change
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
NYT: In an article on Sunday, I outlined the relationship between climate change and a rise in extreme weather. Scientists cite several statistical indicators that suggest the number of extreme events like heat waves and floods is rising. This evidence has taken on a new meaning in this summer of weather disasters, especially the floods in Pakistan and the heat wave in Russia. The United States has not been spared from weather extremes, notably deluges like the disastrous downpour in Tennessee ...
Vedanta ‘in total contempt of the law’ says Indian government
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Ecologist: Damning Indian government report says British-owned mining company's plans should be blocked, as two local tribal campaigners are abducted British-owned mining giant Vedanta Resources has been dealt another blow after the Indian government criticised its latest plans to mine for bauxite in a remote part of eastern India considered sacred by the indigenous population. Earlier this year major investors including the Church of England pulled investments from the company, saying ...
China Floods Increase Pests, Threaten Rice Crops, Ministry Says
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Bloomberg: China's mid-season and late-season rice crops face increasing threats from pests after widespread floods this summer made conditions ideal for insects to breed, the Ministry of Agriculture said today. Twice the amount of pests as last year were detected among crops in provinces from southwestern Guizhou to eastern Zhejiang, the ministry said in a statement on its website. Delayed planting and hotter weather in August and September will also boost breeding, it said, without giving the ...
Australia: Scientists say global warming is undeniable
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Sydney Morning Herald: THE world will be hotter by 2100 than at any time in the past few million years if greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, the Australian Academy of Science warns in a new report. Global emissions would need to peak within the next 10 years, and then decline rapidly for the world to have a better than 50-50 chance of avoiding a temperature rise of 2 degrees, it concludes. Produced and reviewed by two expert panels, the 24-page report, The Science of Climate Change, ...
Russia: Heat probably killed thousands in Moscow: scientist
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Reuters: Several thousand Muscovites are thought to have died in July alone from this year's unprecedented heatwave and August could add more fatalities to the grim statistics, a Russian scientist said on Tuesday. Moscow, a metropolis of over 10 million people, suffered from intense heat since late June, with day temperatures sometimes nearing 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit). The crisis shriveled a third of Russia's grain crop, shaved billions off this year's economic growth ...
United States: Appeals court: Mud from logging roads is pollution
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
AP: A federal appeals court has decided that mud which washes off logging roads is pollution and ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to write regulations to reduce the amount that reaches salmon streams. A conservation group that filed the lawsuit says if the ruling Tuesday by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals stands, logging roads on federal, state and private lands across the West will eventually have to be upgraded. The Northwest Environmental Defense Center in ...
Golden toad saved from brink of extinction
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 17th, 2010
Mongabay: One hundred Kihansi Spray Toads have been flown to their native Tanzania after a close brush with extinction, reports the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS). The species, which last year was declared extinct in the wild by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), was rehabilitated in captivity at the Bronx Zoo and the Toledo Zoo. Since 2004, when the toad was last seen in the wild, the captive population has climbed from a few hundred to nearly 7,000. For now, ...