Archive for May, 2011

VIDEO: Shale search given go-ahead

BBC: A controversial technique to extract gas by creating underground explosions has been given the go-ahead by MPs on the Energy Select Committee. Engineers searching for shale gas near Blackpool argue it could revolutionise world energy markets. Environmentalists have said it pollutes water supplies and increases greenhouse gases.

On the edge of extinction, Philippine eagles being picked off one-by-one

Mongabay: On the edge of extinction, Philippine eagles being picked off one-by-one Down to a few hundred individuals, every Philippine eagle is important if the species is to survive. However, the Philippine Eagle Foundation (PEF) has recently announced that people continue to illegally trap and keep eagles captive. Since December the organization has taken-in four confiscated Philippine eagles (Pithecophaga jefferyi), according to The Philippine Star. One died of a fungal infection after confiscation,...

Congress probes land deal in Alaska’s Tongass forest

McClatchy: For decades, conservationists, the U.S. Forest Service, tribes, Native corporations and the people who live in the Tongass National Forest have warred over how to manage the vast temperate rain forest that covers most of southeast Alaska. The fight resurfaces in Washington this week, as the Native corporation Sealaska makes a case to a Senate committee that it should be able to pick new acreage outside of the original land grants it never took ownership of. The company's choices are controversial,...

FUND-RAISER: New Earth Rising & Ecology Visionaries Need to Eat Too!

EI 2011 $40,000 Mid-Year Fund-Raiser. Together you and EI are time after time winning victories for our shared Earth and being. Now EI needs your help paying modest costs to do so at http://www.rainforestportal.org/shared/donate/ . Dear Earth loving colleagues, It’s official, Ecological Internet has become a global force for ecology sustainability. Just ask the United Nations regarding REDD+ and geo-engineering, UK and other world governments for their logging of old forests, Rainforest Action Network and Greenpeace after being calling out for primary forest logging greenwash; all have felt the wrath of EI’s ecology truth-telling in the past year. Or consider national magazine Utne Reader’s recent naming of myself – Dr. Glen Barry – as a “global visionary… changing your world” for our innovative biocentric campaigning, including challenging mainstream groups. Ecological Internet’s (EI) biannual fund-raiser launches today. We must raise $40,000 over the next several weeks to pay for our basic expenses including my subsistence until the end of the year. This is how EI has raised most of our funds for the past 12 years – network members and information users donating what they can when asked twice a year. It is absolutely essential we meet this goal and we will ...

Why has the weather gone cuckoo?

Philly: After historic flooding along the Mississippi River, record tornado sightings, and even a twister in Northeast Philadelphia last week, it is reasonable to ask if the atmosphere has gone out of its mind. Has worldwide warming pushed it to the brink of riot? Or is its behavior more like that of a beloved relative who has been eccentric all along but we've started noticing? To the chagrin of some scientists, variants of these questions are being disputed heatedly, polemically - and sometimes even...

Using the West’s water to extract the West’s energy: How much is too much?

New West: Consider this: It takes 60 liters of water to keep a single, 60-watt light bulb lit for 12 hours. Water and energy have been inexorably linked in human history at least back to ancient Babylonia, where windmills helped power irrigation as early as 1700 BC. Since then, that relationship has become one of the great axioms of the industrial age -- that is, it takes great volumes of water to extract and convert energy resources, and often great energy resources to move and treat water. And in a...

Q&A: “The Battle for Patagonia Has Just Begun” in Chile

Inter Press Service: The HidroAysén hydroelectric project in Chile’s Patagonia region is causing "a credibility crisis for institutionality and (President) Piñera," environmentalist Sara Larraín told Tierramérica. Tens of thousands of Chileans have joined in protests against a bill will affect six national parks, 11 national reserves, 26 priority conservation sites, 16 wetlands and 32 private protected areas in Patagonia and seven other regions, according to its opponents. On May 9, the Environmental Assessment...

Sealaska land deal hearing in Congress this week

Anchorage Daily News: The fight resurfaces in Washington this week, as the Sealaska Native Corp. makes a case to a Senate committee that it should be able to pick as much as 85,000 acres outside of its original land grants in the forest. The company's picks are controversial, in part because they include valuable old growth timber that many would like to see off-limits to logging. Some local groups, including the Craig Tribal Association, also have concerns about how Sealaska plans to address important cultural locations...

Philippine bird sanctuary under threat

AFP: A plan to reclaim land on Manila Bay is ruffling feathers, with conservationists warning the project would destroy one of the Philippine capital's last nature reserves and bird sanctuaries. Salt marshes, tidal areas and three mangrove-clad islands that make up the 175-hectare (432-acre) zone are a home or a resting spot for dozens of bird species, including the globally-threatened Philippine duck and Chinese egret. In a sprawling megacity of more than 12 million people that has seen decades...

Americans take a gamble with the Mississippi floods

Guardian: A levee protects a house from the flooded Mississippi near Vicksburg. The Riverwalk Casino in Vicksburg was one of the last gambling establishments operating on the Mississippi during these historic floods, and the management lined the drive with insistent signs. "Still open", they said, "Still happy". Another sign, an electric one, bragged about the new decor. Workers had stuck pink plastic flamingos on the 4ft sand wall. The river had swallowed up the lawn and trees and was lapping at the parking...