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Archive for September, 2010
Water meet focuses on pollution and quality
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 5th, 2010
AFP: Increasing water pollution and dwindling water quality around the globe will be the main focus as around 2,500 experts begin gathering in Stockholm Sunday for the 20th edition of the World Water Week. "Driven by demographic change and economic growth, water is increasingly withdrawn, used, reused, treated, and disposed of," organisers cautioned in their introduction to this year's conference. "Urbanisation, agriculture, industry and climate change exert mounting pressure on ...
Diverse water sources key to food security: report
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 5th, 2010
Reuters: Increasingly erratic rainfall patterns related to climate change pose a major threat to food security and economic growth, water experts said on Monday, arguing for greater investment in water storage. In a report by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), experts said Africa and Asia were likely to be hardest hit by unpredictable rainfall, and urged policymakers and farmers to try to find ways of diversifying sources of water. The IWMI research estimates that up ...
Mozambique’s food riots – the true face of global warming
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 5th, 2010
Guardian: It has been a summer of record temperatures – Japan had its hottest summer on record, as did South Florida and New York. Meanwhile, Pakistan and Niger are flooded and the eastern US is mopping up after hurricane Earl. None of these individual events can definitively be attributed to global warming. But to see how climate change will play out in the 21st century, you needn't look to the Met Office. Look, instead, to the deaths and burning tyres in Mozambique's "food riots" to see what happens ...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Mozambique’s food riots – the true face of global warmingTorrential rains kill 18 in Guatemala
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 4th, 2010
Reuters: At least 18 people were killed in Guatemala on Saturday, including a dozen on a bus that was buried in a landslide, as heavy rains lashed the Central American nation and southern Mexico. A dozen people died when the bus they were traveling on was suddenly engulfed by mud around 8 a.m. on the Inter-American highway 50 miles outside of the Guatemalan capital, emergency workers said. Another six people were killed in separate incidents, Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom told ...
Brazilian Dam Would Put Peruvian Jungle Under Water
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 4th, 2010
Inter Press Service: Seen from up high, the route to Puente Inambari looks like a green serpent -- long, robust and sinuous. The Amazon jungle that dominates this landscape will be underwater if one of the largest hydroelectric dams in Peru (and all Latin America) is built. At Puente Inambari, the regions of Puno, Cuzco and Madre de Dios converge, in southeast Peru. Some 70 villages in these regions would have to be relocated if the Peruvian government approves the definitive concession to EGASUR ...
BP Gulf well “secured,” awaiting final kill: U.S.
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 4th, 2010
Reuters: BP Plc's ruptured Gulf of Mexico oil well is secure with no threat of spewing crude again, the top U.S. official overseeing the spill response said on Saturday. "We basically have secured this well," retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen said. "We have essentially eliminated the threat of discharge from the well at this point." A cap atop failed blowout preventer equipment on the Macondo well had sealed in all oil flow since July 15. On Friday, BP replaced the failed equipment ...
Why your sustainable fish may not be as guilt-free as you think
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 4th, 2010
Independent: Since its establishment more than a decade ago, the reputation of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) has been as spotless as the consciences of shoppers who buy fish bearing its blue "tick" logo in the expectation it has been sustainably caught. Until now. In a trenchant attack on the world's biggest certifier of ethical fish, a group of six marine experts have accused the MSC of giving in too readily to the demands of big trawler organisations and endorsing fisheries racked by ...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Why your sustainable fish may not be as guilt-free as you thinkMichigan-Wisconsin To Unite On Climate Change Efforts
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 3rd, 2010
Interlochen Public Radio: Michigan and Wisconsin have agreed to cooperate on efforts to study and slow the effects of climate change in the Great Lakes region. The agreement allows Michigan to adopt Wisconsin's climate plan, which is further along in development. Michael Beaulac, with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment, says it makes sense to cooperate because Great Lakes shipping, wildlife migration and habitat shifts don't stop at state borders. "For example, we may have less ...
/CORRECTED REPEAT*/AFRICA: Woman Researcher Tackles Aflatoxin Poisoning
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 3rd, 2010
Inter Press Service: Despite a bumper harvest of maize just a few months ago, many residents in the eastern part of Kenya are facing hunger and starvation. While granaries in the region may be full, the grain cannot be freely sold, let alone eaten. "It is said to be contaminated. Government experts have warned us that it has aflatoxins," said Judith Mwende from Mutomo village, in Kitui district east Kenya. Aflatoxins, locally known in the region as 'mbuka', have affected nearly all the residents of ...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on /CORRECTED REPEAT*/AFRICA: Woman Researcher Tackles Aflatoxin PoisoningPakistan’s flood weather eased Atlantic hurricanes
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 3rd, 2010
New Scientist: The stalled weather pattern blamed for disastrous floods in Pakistan and a record heatwave in Russia may have averted disasters elsewhere by putting the North Atlantic hurricane season on hold. Forecasters had predicted that warm sea-surface temperatures and the onset of the weather pattern known as La Niña would make a busy Atlantic hurricane season this year. In June, Phil Klotzbach and William Gray of Colorado State University predicted 18 tropical storms, with 10 reaching ...