Archive for October 10th, 2010

How Do Clouds Affect Earth’s Climate?

Discovery News: Some clouds help cool the Earth, but other clouds help keep Earth warm – in part depending on how high up they are in our atmosphere. That's according to Steven Platnick, a satellite researcher with NASA. He studies clouds and how they connect with Earth's climate. He said that low, fluffy clouds keep us cooler. SP: You can appreciate that if you go out on a hot and sunny day, and a cloud passes by overhead, it's a great relief from the heat. And the reason of course is because the ...

Picture: unknown carnivore discovered in Madagascar lake

Mongabay: Researchers have identified a previously unknown species of carnivore lurking in one of the world's most endangered lakes. Durrell's vontsira (Salanoia durrelli), named in honor of the late conservationist and writer Gerald Durrell, was first photographed swimming in Madagascar's Lake Alaotra in 2004. Subsequent surveys by scientists at the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, the Natural History Museum, London, Nature Heritage, Jersey, and Conservation International confirmed the ...

Do wind farms drive local warming?

Mongabay: Using decades-old data researchers have proven a long-suspected effect of wind turbines: under certain conditions large-scale wind farms can change local weather. Temperatures recorded from a wind farm in San Gorgonio, California in 1989 shows that turbines cooled local temperatures during the day, but warmed them at night. However, researchers in the paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science say that the impact of wind farms on local temperatures will not be the ...

Protesters stage mock cleanup at Chevron station

KTVU: Protesters on Sunday staged a mock clean up at a Chevron service station to increase awareness of the oil company's alleged intentional dumping of toxic waste in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Rainforest Action Network coordinated protests at 10 Chevron stations in the city as part of a global action day for climate solutions, Change Chevron Campaign director Maria Ramos said. About 20 protesters converged at noon at the gas station located at 1298 Howard St. Texaco, which is now owned ...

Photos: Massive logjam in Borneo blocks Malaysia’s longest river

Mongabay: A massive 50-km-long (30-mi) logjam has blocked the Rajang river in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo, bringing river traffic to a standstill and posing a threat to riverbank communities, reports Malaysian state media. The Rajang, Malaysia's longest river, is presently unnavigable, according to Bernama. "The river was like a conveyor belt in a sawmill but instead of transporting uniformly cut wood, it carried an endless flow of uprooted trees, discarded logs and all manner of ...

Hungary braces for second wave of toxic sludge

Guardian: Emergency workers in Hungary have warned that another torrent of toxic red sludge will inevitably be unleashed when the remaining walls collapse at a reservoir which still holds more than 500m litres of the liquid waste. The prime minister, Viktor Orban, has promised "the toughest possible" consequences for those responsible for the disaster, which has killed at least seven people and spilled millions of litres of toxic waste. "Behind this tragedy, human errors and mistakes ...

Water cycle goes bust as the world gets warmer

New Scientist: Earth's water cycle has been pushed to its limit. The amount of water evaporating off the land and into the atmosphere hit a maximum 12 years ago and is now in decline, new calculations show. Martin Jung of the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena, Germany, and colleagues calculated trends in evapotranspiration "" the amount of water vapour that entered the atmosphere "" between 1982 and 2008. This moisture is either evaporated off the land by the sun's heat or released by ...

Hungary workers race to build dam as reservoir crack widens

Reuters: Workers are racing to build an emergency dam in western Hungary on Sunday as cracks in a reservoir widen, threatening to unleash a second torrent of toxic sludge on the village of Kolontar and nearby rivers. About one million cubic metres of the waste material leaked out of the alumina plant reservoir into villages and waterways earlier this week, killing seven people, injuring 123 and fouling rivers including a local branch of the Danube. Kolontar was evacuated yesterday after ...