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Archive for October 16th, 2014
New disease ‘killing amphibians’
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 16th, 2014
BBC: A deadly new disease has emerged that is wiping out amphibians, scientists report.
A number of viruses have been found in northern Spain that are killing frog, toad and newt species. Infected animals can suffer from ulcers on their skin and die from internal bleeding.
Researchers fear the strains, which belong to the Ranavirus group, have already spread to other countries.
The study is published in the journal Current Biology.
Lead author Dr Stephen Price, from University College London,...
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Peru glaciers shrink 40% in 44 years: government
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 16th, 2014
Agence France-Presse: Peru's glaciers have shrunk by more than 40 percent since 1970 because of climate change, giving birth to nearly 1,000 new lagoons, national water authority ANA said Thursday.
Peru, which is hosting the United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP 20, in December, used satellite images to carry out the glacier inventory ahead of the high-level meeting.
The worst-affected glacier was 5,200-meter-high (17,000-foot) tourist gem Pastoruri in the Andes mountains, which lost 52 percent of its...
Australia aims to end extinction of native wildlife by 2020
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 16th, 2014
Agence France-Presse: Australia's Environment Minister Greg Hunt has pledged to end the extinction of native mammal species by 2020, with a focus on culprits such as feral cats.
Hunt said Australia had the worst rate of mammal loss in the world and the nation's "greatest failure" in environmental policy was protecting threatened species.
"Our flora and fauna are part of what makes us Australian," he said in a speech late Wednesday.
"I don't want the extinction of species such as the numbat, the quokka, the bilby,...
This proposed pipeline would be even bigger than Keystone XL
Posted by Grist: None Given on October 16th, 2014
Grist: Meet Energy East: It will be 2,858-miles long, putting it right up there with some of the longest pipelines in the world. It would pump about a third more crude than Keystone XL was intended to. It`ll be bigger than the Druzhba pipeline, which carries oil 2,500 miles from Southeast Russia to the rest of Europe.
"Bigger" is the point. There`s no sense in extracting crude from Canada`s tar sands if you can`t sell it in extreme bulk, and a big part of selling it is figuring out how to get it to people....
Global natural gas boom alone won’t slow climate change
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 16th, 2014
ScienceDaily: A new analysis of global energy use, economics and the climate shows that without new climate policies, expanding the current bounty of inexpensive natural gas alone would not slow the growth of global greenhouse gas emissions worldwide over the long term, according to a study appearing today in Nature.
Because natural gas emits half the carbon dioxide of coal, many people hoped the recent natural gas boom could help slow climate change -- and according to government analyses, natural gas did...
This new study explains why fracking won’t solve climate change
Posted by Climate Desk: Tim McDonnell on October 16th, 2014
Climate Desk: For President Obama, fracking is a key weapon against global warming. Abundant natural gas, he said in his State of the Union address this year, is a "bridge fuel" to ubiquitous renewable energy - the key to securing economic growth "with less of the carbon pollution that causes climate change."
Not everyone agrees. In fact, the debate over whether natural gas is the antidote to our deadly addiction to coal, or a faux climate change solution that will stall the clean energy revolution, is one...
Fracking boom will increase global carbon emissions, scientists warn
Posted by Blue and Green: Tom Revell on October 16th, 2014
Blue and Green: A global fracking boom will not help prevent climate change, as cheap shale gas would displace cleaner renewable energy and actually increase carbon emissions, according to a new study.
Because the burning of shale gas, extracted through the controversial process of fracking, releases around 50% less carbon than conventional fossil fuels such as coal, proponents have suggested it could act as a “bridge fuel”.
While investment in renewables is scaled up to meet demand, shale gas could fill in...