Archive for December 18th, 2015

Number global migrants rises dramatically, especially in Asia: U.N

Reuters: The number of international migrants soared to 244 million this year, an increase of more than 40 percent from the year 2000, as economic need, global markets and a desire for better lives put more people on the move, the United Nations said on Friday. Nearly half of the world's migrants were born in Asia, which has provided the most migrants - 1.7 million people per year - over the last 15 years, followed by Europe, according to a report by the U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs....

New Method Unlocks Climate Change Secrets From Tibetan Ice

Eurasia Review: Identifying forest fire molecules in the Tibetan ice could give us an insight into how human activity is contributing to climate change and melting glaciers. A new study published in Talanta presents a method to help scientists identify forest fire molecules in Tibet. The researchers behind the new method, from the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research in China, say their work will enable scientists to spot the molecules produced by burning forests more easily. This will help them understand the...

TMT Project’s construction equipment and vehicles removed from Mauna Kea

Northern Californian: All the construction equipment and vehicles with regard to Thirty Meter Telescope were removed from Mauna Kea on Wednesday. The equipments and vehicles were removed two weeks after the state Supreme Court cancelled the Thirty Meter Telescope’s permit to build on conservation land of the Big Island Volcano. In the starting of the month, the state Supreme Court halted the project by invalidating its construction permit. The judges said that the Board of Land and Natural Resources has made a mistake...

Study Finds Lake Tahoe Warming Due To Climate Change

Associated Press: Lake Tahoe is among hundreds of lakes worldwide that researchers say are warming due to climate change. The study funded by NASA and the National Science Foundation was presented this week at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco. The study used 25 years of satellite and on-scene measurements of 235 lakes representing more than half of the world’s freshwater supply. It found that lakes are warming an average of 0.61 degree each decade, raising concerns about freshwater supplies...

Centuries of melting already locked in for polar ice, scientists say

InsideClimate: The melting of polar ice sheets and mountain glaciers will likely continue for thousands of years, causing irreversible sea level rise, even if global warming is limited to 2 degrees Celsius, according to a new report published last week during the climate negotiations in Paris. Sea levels could rise 13 to 33 feet or more unless far more ambitious steps are quickly taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to the report issued by the International Cryosphere Climate Initiative, a nonprofit...

Faster retreat of Greenland’s ice sheet observed

Agence France-Presse: The Greenland ice sheet, a potentially massive contributor to land-encroaching sea-level rise, lost mass twice as fast between 2003 and 2010 as during the entire 20th century, researchers said on Wednesday. Greenland ice loss contributed to a global average sea level rise of 25mm between 1990 and 2010 - mainly from surface melt, said the research published in the journal Nature. The total mass lost was over 9 000 gigatons (about one billion tons). It was net loss, meaning the difference between...

Telescope construction equipment being removed Mauna Kea

Associated Press: Construction equipment and vehicles that have sat idle since protesters blocked crews from building a giant telescope are being removed from a mountain that's considered sacred to some Native Hawaiians. Protesters who oppose the $1.4 billion Thirty Meter Telescope have been calling for the machinery to be removed after the state Supreme Court earlier this month invalidated the project's permit to build on conservation land of the Big Island volcano. The equipment is coming down sometime today,...

Telescope construction equipment removed from Mauna Kea

Al Jazeera: Construction equipment and vehicles idled since protesters blocked crews from building a giant telescope and the state’s high court revoked its permit are being removed from a mountain that's considered sacred to some Native Hawaiians. The move signals the project faces a potentially significant delay if the team behind the Thirty Meter Telescope ever applies to state officials for a new permit to build at the Mauna Kea volcano on Hawaii's Big Island. Protesters who oppose the $1.4 billion project...