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Archive for January, 2012
A world organisation for an equitable green economy
Posted by SciDev.Net: Zakri Abdul Hamid on January 5th, 2012
SciDev.Net: The proposed UN World Environment Organisation is badly needed to give poor countries a strong voice in green policy, says Zakri Abdul Hamid.
The United Nations will be convening in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, next June to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Earth Summit, held in the same city. The Rio+20 conference will assess progress since 1992 and aim to secure renewed political commitment to sustainable development.
One of the priorities is recognising that current governance systems to...
Uganda: Climate change leaves Uganda on cliffhanger
Posted by Observer: Edward Ssekika on January 5th, 2012
Observer: Evelyn Apolot pensively stares at nothing but a bleak future. Her wrinkled face is a clear testimony of years of toiling to fend for her growing family. Sadly, most of the property she had worked hard for many years to obtain was destroyed in a single night. Her tiny mud-and-wattle grass-thatched hut was first submerged and then razed to the ground by floods triggered by heavy downpour last November. Memories of that devastation are still fresh in her mind. “I lost a lot of property in the floods,”...
Australia: Evans Head to fight erosion
Posted by Northern Star: Jem Wilson on January 5th, 2012
Northern Star: EFFORTS to save the Evans Head surf club from the effects of coastal erosion and climate change will be boosted with a $44,000 grant from the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage.
Richmond Valley Council will use the grant to pay for 50% of a Coastal Zone Management Plan for the Evans Head Coastline and River Estuary.
Previous studies on the likely impact of predicted sea level rises showed a risk of potential erosion at the Evans Head-Casino Surf Life Saving Club by the year 2050.
The...
Five rare earths crucial for clean energy seen in short supply
Posted by Bloomberg: Jim Snyder on January 5th, 2012
Bloomberg: Limited supplies of five rare-earth minerals pose a threat to increasing use of clean-energy technologies such as wind turbines and solar panels, a U.S. Energy Department report found.
The substances -- dysprosium, terbium, europium, neodymium and yttrium -- face potential shortages until 2015, according to the report, which reiterates concerns identified in a report a year ago.
The 2011 report studied 16 elements and related materials, including nickel and manganese, which are used to make...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Five rare earths crucial for clean energy seen in short supplyUnited Kingdom: Scientists warn on damage to peatlands
Posted by Financial Times: None Given on January 5th, 2012
Financial Times: Scientists have warned that damaged UK peatlands – areas formed over thousands of years from dead and decaying plants in waterlogged conditions – are a significant source of carbon dioxide. They release the equivalent of almost 3.7m tonnes of CO2 a year – equal to the average emissions of about 660,000 UK households, more than all the households of Edinburgh, Cardiff and Leeds combined. A report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature describes peatlands as a “Cinderella” habitat:...
Analysis: Clock ticking for rains to save Argentine soy crop
Posted by Reuters: Hugh Bronstein on January 5th, 2012
Reuters: Unrelenting sun in Argentina has scorched as much as a fifth of its corn crop and the drought will start biting into the country's vast soy harvest unless rains come to the rescue this month or next.
Benchmark Chicago corn and soybean prices have both rallied more than 10 percent in the past three weeks as a hot, dry southern hemisphere summer has roasted grain fields across Argentina's legendary Pampas farm and cattle region.
Argentina is the world's second-largest corn exporter and third-largest...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Analysis: Clock ticking for rains to save Argentine soy cropBangladesh: Farmers Bet on Climate-Proof Crops
Posted by Inter Press Service: Naimul Haq on January 5th, 2012
Inter Press Service: With floods, droughts and other calamities battering deltaic Bangladesh regularly, farmers need little prompting in switching to climate-resistant varieties of rice, wheat, pulses and other staples.
The crop diversification, actively supported by the government’s research institutions, is already benefitting the 145 million people of this densely populated, predominantly agricultural South Asian country.
Mosammet Sabera Begum, 38, a farmer in Purbadebu village, Rangpur district, about 370 km...
Putting a Price on The Real Value of Nature
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 5th, 2012
Yale Environment 360: Indian banker Pavan Sukhdev has been grappling with the question of how to place a monetary value on nature. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, he discusses the ways natural ecosystems benefit people and why policymakers and businesses must rethink how they assess environmental costs and benefits.
How do you put a price on the value of nature? That’s the question Indian banker Pavan Sukhdev and his colleagues are seeking to answer in their international project on The Economics of Ecosystems...
Invasive plants said climate change risk
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 5th, 2012
United Press International: Climate change will boost U.S. demand for imported drought- and heat-tolerant plants, at the risk of raising imports of more invasive species, researchers say. Invaders could overrun native ecosystems in the same way kudzu, Oriental bittersweet and other plant species have in the past, researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst said. The kudzu invasion of the past few decades saw whole forests overgrown in the Southeast, and Oriental bittersweet, if left unchecked, shades and chokes...
More extreme weather on Australia’s radar
Posted by Adelaide Now: Sonja Koremans on January 4th, 2012
Adelaide Now: Almost 100 per cent of natural disasters in Australia are weather related, according to Insurance Council Australia. Picture: AFP Source: The Courier-Mail
IAG warns of more natural disasters Australia to be hard hit by climate change Brace for more insurance premium hikes
THE nation's largest insurers have warned Australians to brace for more catastrophic weather brought on by a rising global temperatures.
Last year, Australia and New Zealand accounted for more a third of world's natural...