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Archive for June 10th, 2014
Colorado could be ‘ground zero’ fracking debate
Posted by 9News: Steve Staeger on June 10th, 2014
9News: If state lawmakers can't reach a compromise on fracking, it could lead to a battle on the ballot getting national attention.
Late Tuesday, it appeared a compromise drafted by Governor Hickenlooper and some of his democratic allies was falling apart. The Denver Business Journal reported the Colorado Oil and Gas Association voted against the proposal, after it sat at the table working to draft it.
That news came on the same day two residents of Lafayette filed a class action lawsuit against the...
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Chile Scraps Huge Patagonia Dam Project Years Controversy
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 10th, 2014
National Geographic: Chile's government canceled a controversial plan for five dams on two of Patagonia's wildest rivers Tuesday, after an eight-year battle between environmentalists and developers.
Chile's Committee of Ministers overturned the environmental permits for the HidroAysén project, which would have put dams on the Baker and Pascua Rivers, flooding 5,900 hectares of land in order to generate hydroelectric power.
The committee had previously approved the permits in 2011, but has faced strong public opposition...
Farmers Can Help Slow Down Global Warming: Study
Posted by International Business Times: Parismita Goswami on June 10th, 2014
International Business Times: Farmers around the world could help reduce global climate change by using more-precise quantity of nitrogen-based fertilizers, according to a new study.
According to researchers at Michigan State University, nitrogen fertilizer contributes to emission of green house gas from agricultural fields.
The study involved data from across the world to prove that emission of nitrous oxide, which is a greenhouse gas produced in soil and further application of nitrogen as fertilizer, increases the emission...
China’s deserts are expanding at an alarming rate. So it’s fighting back, with straw mats
Posted by Global Post: None Given on June 10th, 2014
Global Post: We were surrounded by sand.
It stretched in undulating waves to the horizon in all directions.
Wei Men, who works for the Baijitan Nature Reserve in Ningxia province, beckoned for us to step down from our desert overlook and take a close-up look at the desert floor. He wanted to show us what officials hope is the future of this arid stretch of China.
Ningxia is facing a big problem. A small and relatively poor province, its population is growing and it has ambitions to expand its industry...
Climate change could lead to China-India water conflict
Posted by RTCC: Ed King on June 10th, 2014
RTCC: Melting Himalayan glaciers and erratic rainfall could exacerbate tensions between central Asian countries later this century, warn defence analysts in a new report.
They say droughts or extreme rains linked to climate change could place growing populations in China, India and Pakistan under increased stress.
Based on latest research by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the study has been published by the Global Military Advisory Council on Climate Change and Cambridge...
Amazon tribal chief SOS: the white man is destroying everything
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 10th, 2014
Independent: The Brazilian tribal leader who enlisted Sting to help save the Amazon rainforest has accused the developed world of being intent on “destroying everything” and urged its citizens to fundamentally change the way they think.
Twenty-five years ago, Chief Raoni Metuktire, of the indigenous Kayapo population, shot to international prominence as his campaign against hydroelectric dams on the Xingu river galvanized The Police’s frontman.
With the help of Sting and his wife, Trudie Styler, Chief Raoni...
Greenland Glacier Lost ‘Mountain Range’ Worth Ice Last Month
Posted by New York Magazine: Joe Coscarelli on June 10th, 2014
New York Magazine: For those who sleep soundly at night by telling themselves they'll be long gone by the time climate change matters: Environmentalist Bill McKibben points us toward glacier-watchers reporting that a gigantic one in Greenland has lost up to ten cubic kilometers in less than 30 days. Greenland, that's far away, right? And what's a cubic kilometer anyway?
Writes Robert Scribbler:
Think of something the size of a mountain. Now multiply that by ten and you end up with a veritable mountain range....
Another Coal Chemical Spill Pollutes Public Waterway, This Time in Kentucky
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on June 10th, 2014
EcoWatch: On Friday, May 30, another coal-related chemical spill polluted a public waterway in Central Appalachia, killing hundreds of fish and alarming local residents. The chemical spill happened at a Cumberland Coal Company prep plant in Harlan County, KY. This time, the spill was not of coal slurry or a coal-washing chemical, but of a flocculant—a type of compound usually used to control other substances in sediment ponds or clean up spilled material in creeks. Reminiscent of the slurry spill from the...
Soot and Dirt Is Melting Snow and Ice Around the World
Posted by National Geographic: Dennis Dimick on June 10th, 2014
National Geographic: It's easy to imagine new snow so bright that we must avert our eyes even while wearing sunglasses. What scientists are discovering, though, is this brilliant whiteness of snow and ice is increasingly being dimmed by air pollution.
From Greenland's ice sheets to Himalayan glaciers and the snowpacks of western North America, layers of dust and soot are darkening the color of glaciers and snowpacks, causing them to absorb more solar heat and melt more quickly, and earlier in spring.
This trend...
New permafrost forming around shrinking Arctic lakes, but will it last?
Posted by PhysOrg: Katherine Gombay on June 10th, 2014
PhysOrg: Researchers from McGill and the U.S. Geological Survey, more used to measuring thawing permafrost than its expansion, have made a surprising discovery. There is new permafrost forming around Twelvemile Lake in the interior of Alaska. But they have also quickly concluded that, given the current rate of climate change, it won't last beyond the end of this century. Twelvemile Lake, and many others like it, is disappearing. Over the past thirty years, as a result of climate change and thawing permafrost,...