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Archive for March, 2011
Brazil: Can REDD work for the Amazon?
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 5th, 2011
Living on Earth: GELLERMAN: From the Jennifer and Ted Stanley Studios in Somerville, Massachusetts, this is Living on Earth. I'm Bruce Gellerman.
[RAINFOREST NOISES, AKAKI BIRDS CALLING]
GELLERMAN: The Amazon is by far the world's largest rainforest. In this remote corner of the forest, high overhead in the canopy, Akaki birds warn of intruders as our footsteps crunch dead leaves on the forest floor.
The vast Amazon is more than a rainforest--it's also a giant carbon storage system. Scientists call it a...
Canada: The greening of the North: Climate change shrinking tundra, says study
Posted by Postmedia News: Randy Boswell on March 5th, 2011
Postmedia News: The vast Canadian tundra, brought fully into the country's consciousness by Farley Mowat's classic 1956 children's novel Lost in the Barrens, will itself get lost in the woods this century as the treeline marches northward to the Arctic Ocean coast and all but wipes out the desolate but caribou-friendly bioregion from mainland Canada, a new international study predicts.
Forecasting profound changes to all Arctic ecosystems "fuelled by human-induced global warming," the U.S.-led team of scientists...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Canada: The greening of the North: Climate change shrinking tundra, says studyAntarctic ice may be more stable than we thought
Posted by New Scientist: Jeff Hecht on March 5th, 2011
New Scientist: WHETHER Antarctica's ice will survive a warmer world is one of the great puzzles of climate science. Now it seems vast expanses of ice may have hung on for the past 200,000 years, surviving the last interglacial.
The west Antarctic ice sheet's base is below sea level, which should make it unstable. If it were to collapse the torrent of fresh water could raise global sea level by 5 metres. Whether or not this will happen as temperatures climb is a hotly debated topic.
A new study by David Sugden...
United States: Coastal cities prepare for rising sea levels
Posted by LA Times: Tony Barboza on March 5th, 2011
LA Times: Cities along California's coastline that for years have dismissed reports of climate change or lagged in preparing for rising sea levels are now making plans to fortify their beaches, harbors and waterfronts.
Communities up and down the coast have begun drafting plans to build up wetlands as buffers against rising tides, to construct levees and seawalls to keep the waters at bay or to retreat from the shoreline by moving structures inland.
Among them is Newport Beach, a politically conservative...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on United States: Coastal cities prepare for rising sea levelsBP oil spill may be responsible for dolphin deaths
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 4th, 2011
Guardian: Scientists are investigating whether the BP oil disaster, an extreme cold snap, or even a case of the measles has killed nearly 90 bottlenose dolphins in the Gulf of Mexico.
Since the start of the year, 87 bottlenose dolphins have washed up on the coasts of Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and along the Florida panhandle, Kim Amendola, a spokeswoman for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said. That's about 12 times higher than typical strandings at this time of year.
Forty-six...
Despite Failing Scores From Interest Group, House GOP Freshmen Defend Environmental Credentials
Posted by Greenwire: Sarah Abruzzese on March 4th, 2011
Greenwire: Don't let their interest group ratings fool you: Some freshman House Republicans care deeply about the environment. After he learned that the League of Conservation Voters had awarded him a zero out of a 100 percent for his vote last month on H.R. 1, the continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government through Sept. 30, Rep. Steve Southerland of Florida echoed a protest heard from several freshmen about being rated for a vote. Southerland said that while he cares a lot about the environment, "right...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Despite Failing Scores From Interest Group, House GOP Freshmen Defend Environmental CredentialsPeru proposes law to ground wildcat mining tools
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 4th, 2011
Reuters: Days after a clash between wildcat miners and police left two dead in eastern Peru, the country's Environment Minister has proposed a law banning dredging equipment used to extract gold from the Amazon river basin.
The law proposed on Thursday aiming "to protect the environment and public health" in Amazonia will likely be debated in Congress next week. It is the latest phase of an assault on illegal mining launched just months before President Alan Garcia's term ends.
Earlier this month, the...
China’s dams will cause more problems
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 4th, 2011
Guardian: In 2007, China became the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases. Since then, not only the EU and the US, but also developing nations such as the alliance of small island states have put the government in Beijing under pressure to adopt binding emission cuts.
At the 2009 climate summit in Copenhagen, China announced that it would reduce its carbon intensity – the amount of greenhouse gas emissions per unit of economic output – by at least 40% by 2020. Achieving this ambitious goal has become...
Rising CO2 is causing plants to release less water to the atmosphere, researchers say
Posted by Science Centric: None Given on March 4th, 2011
Science Centric: As carbon dioxide levels have risen during the last 150 years, the density of pores that allow plants to breathe has dwindled by 34 percent, restricting the amount of water vapour the plants release to the atmosphere, report scientists from Indiana University Bloomington and Utrecht University in the Netherlands in an upcoming issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (now online).
In a separate paper, also to be published by PNAS, many of the same scientists describe a model...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Rising CO2 is causing plants to release less water to the atmosphere, researchers sayBrazilian beef – greater impact on the environment than we realise
Posted by Science Centric: None Given on March 4th, 2011
Science Centric: Increased export of Brazilian beef indirectly leads to deforestation in the Amazon. New research from Chalmers and SIK that was recently published in Environmental Science and Technology shows that impact on the climate is much greater than current estimates indicate. The researchers are now demanding that indirect effect on land be included when determining a product's carbon footprint.
'If this aspect is not taken into consideration, there is a risk of the wrong signals being sent to policy...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Brazilian beef – greater impact on the environment than we realise