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Archive for September 21st, 2011
Humanity falls deeper into ecological debt: study
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 21st, 2011
Agence France-Presse: Humankind will slip next week into ecological debt, having gobbled up in less then nine months more natural resources than the planet can replenish in a year, researchers said Tuesday.
The most dominant species in Earth's history, in other words, is living beyond the planet's threshold of sustainability, trashing the house it lives in.
At its current pace of consumption humankind will need, by 2030, a second globe to satisfy its voracious appetites and absorb all its waste, the report calculated....
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Researchers produce ‘limitless’ hydrogen from bacteria
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 21st, 2011
Business Green: US scientists have unveiled a cell capable of producing "limitless" supplies of hydrogen using bacteria rather than an external electricity source.
Hydrogen has long been touted as a potential low-carbon source of power for electricity generation and transport, but has suffered from high production costs and the fact that it is commonly generated using fossil fuels.
However, the cell developed by Pennsylvania State University researchers involves using microbial electrolysis cells to produce...
UN chief wants ‘timely action’ to preserve dryland
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 21st, 2011
Press Trust of India: UN chief Ban Ki-Moon on Wednesday asked the international community to take "timely action" to preserve drylands across the world, saying about two billion people depend on drylands for sustenance and income.
Ban was speaking at a high-level meeting at the UN General Assembly convened to highlight the need to reverse desertification.
"The world's drylands are too often an investment desert, seen by governments and the international community as a lost cause," Ban said at the meeting.
"Drought...
SA gold miners sue Anglo American
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 21st, 2011
BBC: Former gold miners in South Africa are suing industry giant Anglo American in the London High Court for allegedly damaging their health, their lawyers say.
The ex-workers contracted lung diseases because of bad ventilation in the UK-based company's South African mines, their lawyers allege.
They are demanding compensation of millions of dollars.
Anglo American says it is "in no way liable" and is defending the claims.
The firm said it had denied liability in answer to similar claims filed...
Oil mats after BP spill pose long-term ecosystem threat: study
Posted by Reuters: Kelli Dugan on September 21st, 2011
Reuters: Auburn University researchers said oil mats submerged in the seabed more than a year after the biggest oil spill in U.S. history pose long-term threats to coastal ecosystems across the northern Gulf of Mexico.
The study, released on Tuesday by the school's engineering department, showed that tarballs churned to the surface by Tropical Storm Lee and deposited along Alabama beaches this month had "essentially identical" chemical composition as samples taken from mats after the Deepwater Horizon...
Indonesia: Veracel destroys rainforests and arable land in favour of cheap paper
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 21st, 2011
Rainforest News: The multinational company Veracel Fibria, owned by the Swedish-Finnish enterprise Stora Enso, is expanding. The company performance is scheduled to be doubled – from currently 1.2 to 2.5 million tons of cellulose per year. In Bahia, the base material for paper is obtained from eucalyptus wood. To date, the monocultures already cover nearly 120.000 hectares. If Veracel implements the plan, the plantations will double in size accordingly.
While the multinational companies reap huge profits, the...
San Diego forum seeks to avert global water shortage
Posted by KPBS: Susan Murphy on September 21st, 2011
KPBS: Fresh water is becoming one of the scarcest natural resources in the world, and it's only going to get worse, said Reno Harnish, director for the Center for Environment and National Security at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. "Because of rising consumption levels due to rising population and declining supplies of clean, potable water."
Population growth and climate change are rapidly draining the global supply of potable water. Scientists and water officials from around the world teamed up...
United Kingdom: Cameron vow to protect green belt
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 21st, 2011
BBC: David Cameron has defended plans to simplify the planning system, saying they aimed to balance environmental and social benefits with economic ones.
In a letter to the National Trust, which has criticised the draft National Planning Policy Framework, he vowed to protect the "magnificent countryside".
Campaigners fear a new "presumption in favour of sustainable development" would extend urban sprawl in England.
The National Trust said it welcomed the prime minister's personal intervention....
Drylands Not a Lost Cause, U.N. Summit Declares
Posted by Inter Press Service: Christian Papesch on September 21st, 2011
Inter Press Service: "If this was a meeting about climate change, I am pretty sure that the room would have been more crowded," Luc Gnacadja, executive secretary of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), commented at a press conference Tuesday. "I think that we need to change the lenses we use to face the issue of desertification," he added. Every minute, 23 hectares of productive land is lost through land degradation, in turn causing the loss of 20 million tonnes of grain every year. Gathered...
CLIMATE ALERT! End the Geo engineering Madness Now! Tethering Artificial Volcanoes from Giant Balloons Risky Science, Not a Viable Climate Solution
Posted by Water Conservation Blog on September 21st, 2011
By Ecological Internet's Climate Ark Climate Change Portal
TAKE ACTION HERE NOW!
Geoengineering [search] is the proposed large scale manipulation of Earths oceans, soils, sunlight and atmosphere with the intent of combating climate change. The UK government and scientific establishment have begun dangerous experiments into the controversial idea of large-scale release of sulfur aerosol directly into the stratosphere in large volumes. They are acting like renegades, as international agreements are in place forbidding such experiments which are not in controlled settings. Simply, a biosphere cannot be engineered. The only way to address climate and ecology change is to end ecosystem loss and fossil fuel use; while equitably reducing emissions, consumption and population. Please tell UK scientists to cancel experiments planned to test equipment for injecting sulfur particles into the stratosphere to counteract global warming. It is too risky and continued geoengineering research - and all but certain implementation if field trials show promise - will certainly have horrific unintended consequences for our shared biosphere - necessary for a habitable Earth.