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Archive for January, 2012
Tainted gold: thousands join protest against Peru’s largest ever mining project
Posted by Ecologist: Gervase Poulden on January 17th, 2012
Ecologist: A US-backed billion-dollar gold mine has attracted thousands of protestors in recent weeks. Many have the poor economic legacy of existing mines fresh in their minds, reports Gervase Pouldon in Cajamarca, Peru
For Segundo Ortiz, a worker at the San Antonio Market in Cajamarca, a city in the north of Peru, the reasons for taking to the street in protest are clear: 'It's about protecting our water supply, nothing more.'
Ortiz feels that if his generation fails to act to stop the construction...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Tainted gold: thousands join protest against Peru’s largest ever mining projectNO2 levels over India increasing, says data
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 17th, 2012
Times of India: The satellite data of tropospheric pollution over Asia shows that there has been a rise in nitrogen dioxide (NO2) level over India and China. It is due to usage of more fossil fuel. At the same time, there is a decline in the level of nitrogen dioxide in Europe and US, said Andreas Richter, senior scientist, University of Bremen, Germany.
He was speaking at the Indo-German workshop on 'challenges and opportunities in air pollution and climate change' organised by the Indian Institute of Tropical...
Thousands ‘forcibly relocated’ in Ethiopia, says HRW report
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 17th, 2012
Guardian: The Ethiopian government is forcibly moving tens of thousands of people in the remote western Gambella region, with villagers being told that their resettlement is connected to the leasing of large tracts of land for commercial agriculture, according to a human rights group.
Waiting for Death, a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report, said the population transfers under the "villagisation" programme are being carried out with little consultation or compensation. People are being moved to new villages...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Thousands ‘forcibly relocated’ in Ethiopia, says HRW reportKenya: Key Lakes Succumb to Human Activities
Posted by Inter Press Service: Peter Kahare on January 17th, 2012
Inter Press Service: Several years ago, Lakes Kamnarok and Ol Bollosat in Kenya were vibrant water bodies that supported and shaped the ecosystems around them. But today they are shells of their former selves, due to heavy siltation caused by human activities.
"Siltation is still happening, the lake is drying up and this is threatening Lake Kamnarok and the wildlife with extinction, besides affecting the lives of people around it," Elijah Chemitei, senior warden in Baringo County, in the Rift Valley Province, told...
La Nina ‘may abet’ flu pandemics
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 16th, 2012
BBC: La Nina events may make flu pandemics more likely, research suggests.
US-based scientists found that the last four pandemics all occurred after La Nina events, which bring cool waters to the surface of the eastern Pacific.
In Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), they say that flu-carrying birds may change migratory patterns during La Nina conditions.
However, many other La Nina events have not seen novel flu strains spread around the world, they caution.
So while the...
Revealed: Europe’s plan to penalise Canada’s tar sands goes Dutch
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 16th, 2012
Guardian: Following in the UK's footsteps, the Netherlands is now working to derail a European Commission proposal to officially designate fuels from Canada's vast tar sands fields as highly polluting and discourage their use.
A secret proposal, which I have seen, means that instead of companies being responsible for curbing the overall carbon emissions of the transport fuels they sell, countries would be responsible. That would lead to the ludicrous and legally laughable situation that when one company...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Revealed: Europe’s plan to penalise Canada’s tar sands goes DutchUK must rethink its unfailing support for Canada’s fossil fuels
Posted by Guardian: Kelly Rigg on January 16th, 2012
Guardian: If it's true that desperate times call for desperate measures, the Canadian government is acting like a junkie in need of a fix. As public hearings on the proposed Northern Gateway tar sands pipeline proposal got underway in British Columbia last week, natural resources minister, Joe Oliver, lashed out at "environmental and other radical groups" and "jet-setting celebrities." In an open letter, he accused them of being the stooges of foreign special-interest groups, opposing tar sands development...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on UK must rethink its unfailing support for Canada’s fossil fuelsRising carbon dioxide confuses brain signaling in fish
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 16th, 2012
ScienceNews: A new study may explain how rising carbon dioxide concentrations -- and the ocean acidification they induce -- can cause topsy-turvy changes in the behavior of fish. Like a flipped switch, the normal response of nerve cells can reverse as acidifying seawater perturbs how a fish regulates acids and bases in its body, including the brain.
“This could be a big deal,” says neurobiologist Andrew Dittman of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Seattle....
Bulgarian protestors demand ban on shale gas
Posted by EurActiv: None Given on January 16th, 2012
EurActiv: Thousands of Bulgarians have protested against exploration for shale gas over fears it could poison underground water, trigger earthquakes and pose serious public health hazards.
Protestors rallied in more than six Bulgarian cities on Saturday (14 January) calling for a moratorium on 'fracking' - shale gas tests using hydraulic fracturing - and demanding a new law to ban unconventional drilling for gas in the country.
"I am opposed because we do not know what chemicals they will put in the...
China cancer village tests reach of law against pollution
Posted by Reuters: Sui-Lee Wee on January 16th, 2012
Reuters: Nothing in Wu Wenyong's rural childhood hinted he would end up on a hospital bed aged 15, battling two kinds of cancer.
Born to poor farmers in Xiaoxin, a dusty village of low brick houses in southwestern Yunnan province, he paddled in the Nanpan River as a child and later helped his parents tend rice.
About 3 km (two miles) from Wu's home stands a three-storey high hill of chromium slag produced from the Yunnan Luliang Peace Technology Company. The runoff from chromium-6, listed as a carcinogen...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on China cancer village tests reach of law against pollution