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Archive for February 17th, 2014
UK storms & flooding set back rail repairs
Posted by Guardian: Weekend Bad Weather Hits London To Brighton Line and West Coast Briefly Disrupte on February 17th, 2014
Guardian: Weekend storms have caused further damage to the railways and set back repair schedules, but engineers have restored many of the train services most disrupted by floods on the Great Western main line.
Despite the severe weather abating, rising groundwater has caused fresh problems, with a tunnel blocked by water on the main London to Brighton line.
Network Rail said water levels in the tunnel at Patcham were 48.1 metres (157ft) above average, leaving tracks more than 1 metre under water. Rail...
Posted in 
UK weather: changing jet stream linked to flooding crisis
Posted by Blue and Green: Tom Revell on February 17th, 2014
Blue and Green: The system of winds that is responsible for bringing weather to Northern Europe and North America may be changing, new research has found.
A study suggests that the jet stream, a high-speed air current that carries weather around the globe, is taking a longer, more meandering route than usual. This means that weather patterns will remain the same in some areas for longer periods.
If accurate, these findings could explain the recent stormy spell that has brought devastating flooding to many...
Russia: Sochi weathers warm temperatures but struggles with fog
Posted by Reuters: Karolos Grohmann on February 17th, 2014
Reuters: Organizers of the Sochi Olympics defied the odds when they battled unusually warm temperatures for a week but they were helpless against a winter fog that caused events to be postponed on Monday.
The men's biathlon 15km mass start was called off for a second straight day and thick fog also forced the postponement of the men's snowboard cross competition.
"I think it is actually quite ironic that the biggest issue we've had so far is due to winter fog and that's led to the biggest postponement...
Brazil land disputes spread as Indians take on wildcat miners
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 17th, 2014
Reuters: As Brazil struggles to solve land disputes between Indians and farmers on the expanding frontier of its agricultural heartland, more tensions over forest and mineral resources are brewing in the remote Amazon.
The government of President Dilma Rousseff gave eviction notices to hundreds of non-Indian families in the Awá-Guajá reserve in Maranhão state in January and plans to relocate them by April, with the help of the army if necessary, Indian affairs agency Funai says.
The court order to clear...
United Kingdom: Miliband wades into climate change and flooding row
Posted by BusinessGreen: James Murray on February 17th, 2014
BusinessGreen: Labour leader Ed Miliband has made his boldest intervention to date in the long-running debate over the UK's climate policy, warning that floods have highlighted how the UK risks "sleepwalking into a national security crisis on climate change".
In an interview with the Observer newspaper, conducted while he toured flood hit areas last week, Miliband argued that the country's political class urgently needs to rebuild the political consensus on climate policy that held sway in the run up to the...
Climate change: Tibet wettest in 2010 in 3,500 years
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 17th, 2014
Indo-Asian News Service: Recent decades have likely been the wettest on record in the semi-arid Tibetan plateau, researchers say, warning that any further large-scale warming might lead to even greater rainfall in Tibet, the birthplace for Asia's great rivers.
The wettest individual year reconstructed in 3,500 years in northeastern Tibet is 2010, say climate researchers at the University of East Anglia (UEA) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in an online paper in US academic journal Proceedings of the National Academy...
Methane, friend and foe for climate change
Posted by Washington Post: Editorial on February 17th, 2014
Washington Post: A STUDY in the journal Science finds that the United States is putting a lot more methane, a potent contributor to global warming and the primary compound in natural gas, into the air than the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has estimated. But the report also shows that the problem is fixable -- and not a reason to shut down the controversial extraction method known as fracking. Natural gas, as a transitional fuel, remains an important response to climate change.
Methane is a powerful driver...
United Kingdom: On climate change, Ed Miliband must match his bold words with real action
Posted by Guardian: John Harris on February 17th, 2014
Guardian: 'Either denial or dither on climate change will damage the country," says Ed Miliband, perhaps going a bit too heavy on the alliteration. The science, he reminds us, is clear, and he wants to somehow rebuild a national consensus. Time, then, for another "D" word: "decent" Tories and Liberal Democrats, he says, will be expected to muck in. He wants us to understand the true meaning of the recent floods and restore climate change to the prominence it enjoyed before the anti-climax of 2009's UN Copenhagen...
While Britain Floods, Politicians Debate Climate Change
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on February 17th, 2014
Time: Britons are normally never more comfortable than when talking about the weather, but recent extreme weather events have began to test that theory. Since December, the U.K. has faced a relentless assault from some of the worst winter weather on record. It began with the worst storm and tidal surges in 60 years hitting the North Sea coastline, floods that ruined Christmas for thousands across Surrey and Dorset and in January, the most exceptional period of rainfall since 1766. The deluge has transformed...
If You Think the Weather Is Bad Now, Wait Until El Niño Returns
Posted by AlterNet: Alex Kane on February 17th, 2014
AlterNet: The year 2015 could see disastrous weather all over the globe caused by El Niño: droughts, high temperatures, heavy rain and floods. A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences predicts that the El Niño weather pattern will occur next year.
El Niño refers to a recurring weather pattern that develops off the west coast of South America and causes warm temperatures and changes in the climate. Usually, scientists can predict El Niño a few months before it occurs....