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Archive for June 13th, 2012
Global Warming Text Was Removed From Virginia Bill on Rising Sea Levels
Posted by U.S. News and World Report: Seth Cline on June 13th, 2012
U.S. News and World Report: Two Southern states have made it clear they want nothing to do with the idea of global warming.
A day after the North Carolina state senate passed a bill requiring science on rising sea levels to be ignored, Virginia lawmakers allowed a study on its coastline to begin on the state's dime only after all references to climate change or global warming were removed from its funding proposal.
[Sea Level Bill Would Allow North Carolina to Stick Its Head in the Sand]
Looking to address flooding...
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Climate Change May Spark More Wildfires In Future
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 13th, 2012
National Public Radio: AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
The fires now raging in Colorado and elsewhere may be bad, but scientists studying the relationship between wildfires and climate change have this warning: In the coming years, they're probably going to get worse.
Max Moritz is lead author of the study and on the faculty at the University of California, Berkeley's College of Natural Resources.
And, Max, what you did here is try to predict where in the future fires are likely to occur and how frequently. How did you do...
Peak planet: Are we starting to consume less?
Posted by New Scientist: Fred Pearce on June 13th, 2012
New Scientist: HUMANITY is doomed. Or it was in 1798, when English scholar Robert Malthus published his influential An Essay on the Principle of Population. Malthus predicted that unchecked growth in human numbers would condemn our species to a "perpetual struggle for room and food" and an unbreakable cycle of squalor, famine and disease. Nearly two centuries later, biologist Paul Ehrlich was no less pessimistic. We had exceeded the planet's "carrying capacity", he declared in his 1968 bestseller The Population...
Alarm rising over food crisis in Sahel region
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 13th, 2012
Mongabay: Warnings over a possible famine in Africa's Sahel region are becoming louder and more intense. Abnormal drought, locally high food prices, and regional conflict have ramped up concerns that 18 million people could suffer from malnutrition and starvation as the lean season sets in. UNICEF says it needs $238 million to save over a million children from severe malnourishment in the region, but has to date only raised $93 million.
"Across the Sahel we are dealing with multiple needs to save lives...
Southwest drought, climate warming and fuel: an explosive combination for record wildfires
Posted by Washington Post: Jason Samenow on June 13th, 2012
Washington Post: During the last two summers, wildfires have run rampant in the Southwest, setting record after record for size and destructiveness. It's no coincidence that severe drought and much above normal temperatures have been occurring in these same areas - although land-management practices and a surplus of combustible material - bear some responsibility as well.
Consider all of these wildfire records set in 2011 and 2012:
Texas: Suffered its worst wildfire season on record in 2011, with 30,457 fires...
Cuomo Plan Would Limit Gas Drilling to a Few Counties in New York
Posted by New York Times: Danny Hakim on June 13th, 2012
New York Times: Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s administration is pursuing a plan to limit the controversial drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing to portions of several struggling New York counties along the border with Pennsylvania, and to permit it only in communities that express support for the technology. The plan, described by a senior official at the State Department of Environmental Conservation and others with knowledge of the administration’s strategy, would limit drilling to the deepest areas of the...
Climate Study: Missouri’s extreme storms bring greater flood risk
Posted by Daily Journal: None Given on June 13th, 2012
Daily Journal: A new report says deluges that in recent years washed out Cedar Rapids, Iowa, forced the Army Corps of Engineers to intentionally blow up levees to save Cairo, Ill., and sent the Missouri River over its banks for hundreds of miles are part of a growing trend.
If the findings of a recent study about Midwest climate change is accurate, people in the Parkland might want to invest in a nice raincoat, umbrella and boots -- maybe even two.
The kind of deluges that in recent years washed out Cedar...
Rio+20 a chance to engage smallholder farms in sustainable agriculture
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 13th, 2012
Guardian: The draft outcome document of the Rio+20 summit mentions smallholder farmers – many of them women – in growing acknowledgment of their importance in terms of food security, with the continued threat of famine in the Sahel, and environmental sustainability, as farming accounts for at least 14% of global greenhouse emissions.
That smallholder farmers are on the agenda is gratifying for Kanayo Nwanze, president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (Ifad), one of the three UN food...
United States: In the Wild, Seeking an Answer: What Replaces Dying Trees?
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 13th, 2012
New York Times: The coastal mountains of southeastern Alaska rise steeply from the Pacific Ocean. Fjords and channels separate over 1,000 islands from the mainland. Dressed like fishermen, we traipse through forests and crawl through brush as weather fronts whip through inlets and rumble along the outer coast.
Duct tape often fails, and “waterproof” data sheets reach saturation by mid-morning. Yet we persist.
What I had in my head actually seemed easy. Stage one: measure all the plants and trees in plots of...
Clinton to attend Rio+20 conference
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 13th, 2012
Reuters: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will lead a delegation of officials to the United Nation's sustainability conference in Rio de Janeiro from June 20-22, the State Department said Tuesday, signaling a stronger U.S. commitment to the summit.
The announcement comes after U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in April called on U.S. President Barack Obama to attend the conference and to take a more active role in global efforts to curb climate change.
Environmental NGOs had hoped Obama would participate...