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Archive for January 24th, 2014
Crops Eating Into World’s Natural Land Base
Posted by Environment News Service: None Given on January 24th, 2014
Environment News Service: Lands covering an area the size of Brazil could be degraded by 2050 if conversion of natural lands to crop lands continues, warns a report by the UN Environment Programme, presented at the ongoing World Economic Conference in Davos.
The report, "Assessing Global Land Use: Balancing Consumption with Sustainable Supply," was produced by the International Resource Panel, a consortium of 27 internationally renowned resource scientists, 33 national governments and other groups, hosted by UNEP.
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Yukon Government Opens Vast Wilderness to Mining
Posted by National Geographic: Tom Clynes on January 24th, 2014
National Geographic: Canada's Yukon Territory announced on Tuesday that it has opened one of the largest unbroken wilderness areas in North America to mining and mineral exploration.
The government's decree stunned indigenous leaders, who support a 2011 plan developed under Yukon land claims treaties that would have maintained the wilderness character of 80 percent of the area, which is known as the Peel watershed region. The government's new plan all but reverses that figure, opening some 71 percent of the watershed...
Canadian tar-sand oil could start flooding into Europe
Posted by Grist: None Given on January 24th, 2014
Grist: Hey, European drivers, how would you like your gasoline to be even more filthy and climate-changing than it already is?
When the European Commission proposed new climate and energy rules for the European Union this week, it recommended opening a door for companies that want to import Canadian tar-sands oil into the continent. Responding to Climate Change explains:
Oil from Canada’s carbon-intensive tar sands - one of the world’s single biggest sources of greenhouse gas pollution - could be...
Al Gore on Climate Change: ‘Extreme Weather Events Are a Gamechanger’
Posted by Mashable: None Given on January 24th, 2014
Mashable: Climate change made an appearance at the 44th annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, thanks to former Vice-President Al Gore and former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. The two world figures commented on how extreme weather events are intensifying global awareness of the climate change phenomenon.
The weather events they mentioned include the likes of the recent typhoon Haiyan and Hurricane Sandy, both of which caused huge economic and human damage.
“I think that these extreme weather...
Cost of climate change high on Davos agenda
Posted by Deutsche Welle: None Given on January 24th, 2014
Deutsche Welle: Issues related to climate change are taking center stage at this year's World Economic Forum in Davos. In WEF's Global Risk Report, extreme weather events are viewed as the second biggest threat to societies.
From within the Davos Congress Center, you can see skiers racing down the slopes outside of the World Economic Forum. Looking at the snow outside, some participants might wonder why there's so much talk about global warming.
Not so Christiana Figueres. Standing in the snow, the UN climate...
Al Gore: ‘extreme weather has made people wake up to climate change’
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 24th, 2014
Guardian: Extreme weather events including typhoon Haiyan and superstorm Sandy are proving a "gamechanger" for public awareness of the threat posed by climate change, Al Gore said on Friday.
The former US vice-president, speaking to delegates at the World Economic Forum in Davos, said: "I think that these extreme weather events which are now a hundred times more common than 30 years ago are really waking people's awareness all over the world [on climate change], and I think that is a gamechanger. It comes...
Increase in Tar Sands-Derived Fuel Will Set States Back on Emission Standards and Climate Goals
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on January 24th, 2014
EcoWatch: Motorists from Maine to Maryland will soon be filling their tanks with gas increasingly derived from dirty Canadian tar sands oil, a new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) says.
A flood of dirty fuel into these East Coast states would undercut their efforts to reduce carbon pollution. The NRDC report, What’s in Your Tank? Northeast and Mid-Atlantic States Need to Reject Tar Sands and Support Clean Fuels, found that under current plans, tar sands-derived gasoline supplies...
Australia: Heatwave blamed for large spike in the number of deaths in Victoria last week
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 24th, 2014
Australian Broadcasting Corporation: The heatwave that baked large parts of south-eastern Australia last week is being blamed for a large spike in the number of deaths in Victoria.
More than 203 deaths were reported to the coroner, more than twice the average.
The Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine expects the number of deaths to reach that of the unprecedented heatwave in 2009, which is thought to have killed more than 370 people in Victoria alone.
Temperatures across the south-eastern states regularly pushed above 40C...
Report: Tar-sands-derived gasoline threatening environment
Posted by MPBN: None Given on January 24th, 2014
MPBN: Over the next six years, Mainers and other motorists around the Northeast can expect to be filling up their gas tanks with gas that is increasingly derived from Canadian tar sands oil. That's according to a new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council, which says the carbon intensive extraction and refining process for tar sands runs counter to many states' plans to cut carbon pollution, the major driver of climate change. Susan Sharon has more. According to the report, extracting and refining...
The Winter Olympics Risk Being Canceled on Account of Global Warming
Posted by Softpedia: None Given on January 24th, 2014
Softpedia: A new paper authored by researchers working with the University of Waterloo in Canada and the Management Center Innsbruck in Austria warns that the Winter Olympics are threatened by climate change and global warning.
The specialists say that, after analyzing several climate models, they found that, thanks to an increase in global average temperatures, just 6 of the cities that have until now housed this celebration will remain cold enough to play host to the Winter Olympics by the end of the century....