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Archive for June 13th, 2013
Climate change threatens water and food security in Antigua
Posted by Environment Health: Desmond Brown on June 13th, 2013
Environment Health: With their islands devoid of rivers or streams, farmers in Antigua and Barbuda have been building dams and ponds for centuries, harvesting rainwater to irrigate their crops and provide drinking water for their livestock.
But now with the advent of climate change, they are facing major challenges. Stronger and more frequent storms regularly destroy trees planted around catchment areas as watershed as well as grass planted in and around these areas to slow evaporation.
"Since 1995, since Hurricane...
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As drought turns to flood, farmers get ‘weather whiplash.’
Posted by Environment Health: Peggy Lowe on June 13th, 2013
Environment Health: As Chris Webber checked the 40 acres of muddy field he wanted to plant on a recent morning, he worried about getting more rain, even as he worried about the lack of it.
"The drought is over at the moment," he says. "But in Missouri, we tend to say that in 10 days or two weeks, we can be in a drought again. That's how fast it can get back to dry."
Midwestern farmers like Webber, who has a family farm in central Missouri, are suffering from "weather whiplash," according to meteorologist Jeff...
Climate change threatens California’s stock of native fish
Posted by Environment Health: None Given on June 13th, 2013
Environment Health: California's rivers and lakes are getting warmer, which puts a great deal of stress on the native fish that live in those bodies of water. But all isn't lost. There are changes that could be made that could help keep them from going extinct.
As summer begins along many U.S. rivers, you'll find anglers patiently contemplating their rods in the flowing water.
But researchers say when it comes to California, in the future they may be out of luck if they are looking to hook an indigenous fish....
Climate change impacting Tahoe clarity
Posted by Environment Health: Margaret Moran on June 13th, 2013
Environment Health: Climate change is helping warm Lake Tahoe’s cobalt blue waters, which could complicate efforts to maintain its famed clarity, said one of America’s most respected scientists and an expert on the Sierra lake.
Over the last 30 years, Lake Tahoe has warmed about a 1 degree Fahrenheit, a result of the lake not releasing as much heat back into the atmosphere due to carbon dioxide blanketing, said renowned limnologist Charles Goldman.
“These are serious times, and this carbon dioxide question is...
Serbia readies flood defences as Danube nears record high
Posted by Reuters: Valerie Hopkins on June 13th, 2013
Reuters: Water levels in the Serbian stretch of the Danube river neared a 50-year high on Thursday as the Balkan country braced for a wave of floods that have already ravaged parts of central Europe.
Authorities stressed they did not expect the kind of damage seen in Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary, where at least a dozen people died and tens of thousands fled their homes.
The army was placed on standby and dozens of people were evacuated from mainly weekend settlements...
Czechs hope wealth-destroying floods can lift growth
Posted by Reuters: Michael Winfrey on June 13th, 2013
Reuters: Floods that have caused billions of euros in damage across central Europe may actually provide an economic boost for the Czech Republic, a country struggling to shrug off its longest recession in more than two decades.
Governments and insurers from Germany to Romania will have to pick up the costs of helping families and business recover from the floods, which have killed at least a dozen people and driven hundreds of thousands from their homes since the start of June.
But central bank Governor...
Antarctic Ice Shelves Melt Mostly From Below
Posted by LiveScience: Douglas Main on June 13th, 2013
LiveScience: When iceberg chunks break off of floating ice shelves, it can serve as dramatic proof of melting -- and this traditionally has been considered the main way that these expanses of Antarctic ice become smaller. But new research reveals a disconcerting finding that is invisible to the naked eye: These ice shelves primarily melt from below.
Knowing what is driving ice-shelf melt is important because when ice shelves lose mass, they speed up the flow of land-bound glaciers that feed them, moving ice...
Nicaragua waterway to dwarf Panama canal
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 13th, 2013
Guardian: Nicaragua's parliament is due to vote on Thursday on one of the biggest infrastructure projects in Latin America's history – a trans-oceanic canal that is to be built and run by a Chinese company.
If it goes ahead, the $40bn (£26bn) scheme, which is twice as expensive as Brazil's Belo Monte dam and likely to be three times longer than the Panama canal, looks set to transform global shipping and jump start the economy of this Central American nation.
As well as the waterway, the draft agreement...
Shale Gas: China’s Untapped Resource
Posted by Forbes: Jack Perkowski on June 13th, 2013
Forbes: When I met recently with a senior investment officer from China Investment Corporation (CIC), the country’s sovereign wealth fund, I was told that CIC is very bullish on the United States. Why? In CIC’s opinion, the existence of large shale gas reserves in the U.S. will provide a massive shot in the arm for the country’s large but mature economy -- kind of a modern-day energy equivalent to the deus ex machina in Greek literature.
If that is the case, then an equally bullish case can be made for...