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Archive for July 27th, 2012
Hidden Rift Deep Beneath the Ice May be Accelerating Melting in West Antarctica
Posted by Environmental News Network: David A Gabel on July 27th, 2012
Environmental News Network: Scientists with the British Antarctic Survey have discovered a rift valley that is one mile deep. The valley is hidden deep below the Ferrigno Ice Stream in West Antarctica, an extremely remote region seen only once previously by human eyes in 1961. They found that this rift basin is connected to the ocean, allowing the ocean to penetrate into the continent. The Southern Sea impacting the ice has a warming effect, despite its cold temperatures. This has tremendous implications, as the West Antarctic...
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Greenland’s ice sheet melt: a sensational picture of a blunt fact
Posted by Guardian: Jonathan Jones on July 27th, 2012
Guardian: This is the most frightening picture you will ever see. The information expressed visually here can be summed up in three words: change or die. So let's take a closer look.
These two juxtaposed images of Greenland are based on observations by satellites monitored by Nasa. The view on the left synthesises their collective view of this inhospitable landmass in the Arctic Circle on 8 July 2012. That on the right shows what Greenland looked like to the same satellites on 12 July, just four days later....
Grand Canyon-sized rift discovered under Antarctic ice
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 27th, 2012
Agence France-Presse: Scientists have discovered a rift the size of the Grand Canyon hidden under the Antarctic ice sheet, which they say is contributing to ice melt and a consequent rise in the sea level.
The rift, some 1.5 kilometres (one mile) deep, 10 kilometres wide and 100 kilometres long, was found by researchers using radar to measure the subglacial topography, glaciologist Robert Bingham told AFP.
"If you imagine the Grand Canyon but filled with ice and then even that whole feature is then also uniformly...
How summer thunderstorms could be punching new holes in the ozone layer
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 27th, 2012
Christian Science Monitor: Global warming could open new holes in Earth's ozone layer at latitudes that until now have seemed immune to the ozone destruction that recurs over Antarctica and the Arctic, a new study warns.
Jonathan Shanklin, Meteorologist at the British Antarctic Survey, was one of the team that discovered the ozone hole in 1985.
The underappreciated keys to this conundrum: water vapor and temperatures in the lower stratosphere, where the ozone layer appears. Both, the researchers say, reach summertime...
New initiative to help 10 central African countries in monitoring: FAO
Posted by FNB News: None Given on July 27th, 2012
FNB News: A new regional initiative will help 10 central African countries to set up advanced national forest monitoring systems, FAO announced on Thursday. The 10 countries are part of the Congo Basin and include Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Rwanda and São Tomé and Principe.
The forestry project will be managed jointly by the Central Africa Forests Commission (COMIFAC) and FAO in close collaboration...
Canada, of all places, should understand climate change
Posted by Globe and Mail: Jeffrey Simpson on July 27th, 2012
Globe and Mail: The United States is experiencing the hottest year on record. Most of the country's warmest years have come in the past decade. Worldwide, the 13 warmest years on record (record keeping began in the 1880s) have come in the past 15 years.
And so on, year after year. Weather changes yearly do equate to a changed climate, but when a pattern takes hold over a sustained period of time, as it has, then something is happening. And that something is of course climate change, which among other effects...
Fierce storms in Northeast, yes, but probably not a derecho
Posted by LA Times: Michael Muskal on July 27th, 2012
LA Times: The Northeast, and New York in particular, had to deal with some fierce storms this week, but the event most likely wasn't a true derecho, officials said Friday.
Though the storms carried strong winds that brought down power lines and led to the deaths of at least two people, meteorologists were reluctant to characterize them as a derecho, a series of wind storms over a large area.
"There is no official proclamation,' Joey Picca , a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said in a...
United States: Court Rejects a Ban on Local Fracking Limits
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 27th, 2012
New York Times: A Pennsylvania court on Thursday struck down a provision of a state law that forbade municipalities to limit where natural gas drilling could take place within their boundaries.
The law, known as Act 13 and approved in February, required that drilling be allowed in all zoning districts, even residential areas, although with certain buffers. The law had been sought by drillers who have been fracking in the Marcellus Shale and wanted uniformity in rules on where they could drill.
But an appellate...
Why science is a non-issue in the US presidential election – again
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 27th, 2012
National Public Radio: IRA FLATOW, HOST:
This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow.
A flurry of extreme weather events, including wildfires, heat waves and droughts may have convinced more Americans that the planet is warming. A poll by the Brookings Institute found that 62 percent of Americans now believe in global warming, and nearly half of them have cited warmer temperatures or change in weather patterns as the reason for their belief.
But will climate change be on the agenda during the upcoming presidential...
US drought: gasoline prices rise as corn stalks shrivel
Posted by Christian Science Monitor: Ron Scherer on July 27th, 2012
Christian Science Monitor: Since the beginning of July, the price of gasoline has risen about 16 cents a gallon, according to AAA. Energy analysts say at least some of that rise can be attributed to the severe drought scorching the Midwest plains because about 10 percent of each gallon of fuel is made from ethanol. One of the main ingredients of ethanol is corn.
Because of the drought, the price of corn has soared. It is now just under $8 a bushel, up about 23 percent on the year and up 39 percent over the past five weeks....