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Archive for November, 2011
Nebraska lawmakers vote to reroute oil pipeline
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Reuters: The Nebraska legislature on Wednesday voted 45-0 to advance a proposed law that would reroute the $7 billion TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline, avoiding the SandHills and Ogallala aquifer that environmental groups and many residents fear could be polluted by a spill.
Under the bill, the state would pay for a new environmental study for a new route for the pipeline, which would carry crude oil from Canada's oilsands area to Texas refineries.
On Monday, Nebraska and TransCanada Corp agreed to...
United Kingdom: Restoration of UK Peatlands Is Advocated by Conservation Group
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Yale Environment 360: The UK’s extensive peatlands and peatbogs must be protected and restored to avoid large-scale releases of carbon dioxide and to protect water supplies, according to a new study by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The report said that 80 percent of the peatbogs in Britain, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and islands such as the Hebrides have been damaged by overgrazing, burning, draining, or extraction for peat moss. These peatlands -- up to 40 feet thick in places...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on United Kingdom: Restoration of UK Peatlands Is Advocated by Conservation GroupInsight: Australia’s coal-seam gas industry feels political heat
Posted by Reuters: Rebekah Kebede on November 16th, 2011
Reuters: - On a recent spring day in the small Australian farming town of Gunnedah, an unlikely protestor takes the microphone to open a rally against the rapidly growing coal-seam gas industry: national radio talk-show host Alan Jones.
Jones, who broadcasts out of Sydney, has come to this remote community to show solidarity with a few hundred locals carrying yellow triangular signs reading "Farms Not Gas" and "Coal Seam Gas Stinks," part of a growing revolt against an industry spreading rapidly across...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Insight: Australia’s coal-seam gas industry feels political heatFish and rice flourish together in paddies
Posted by SciDev.Net: Jan Piotrowski on November 16th, 2011
SciDev.Net: A traditional farming technique that cultivates rice and fish side-by-side could help small farmers earn more money from their crops and reduce the impact on the environment, according to a study.
When fish were introduced into flooded paddy fields, farmers were able to grow the same amount of grain as in conventional rice monocultures -- but with more than two-thirds less pesticide and a quarter less fertiliser, found a six-year long study conducted in China.
These rice-fish co-cultures could...
Thirsty Power Plants Threaten Watersheds
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
New York Times: The first chapter of a new report on the effect of power plants on freshwater systems has the feel of a documentary film. Imagine a camera panning the dessicated Texas landscape as a voice intones statistics from the brutal 2011 drought - a dried-up Brazos River, 80 days of 100-degree-plus temperatures, and so on.
And then the punch line: "An energy-water collision wasn`t far behind."
Cut to a close-up: "One plant had to curtail nighttime operations because the drought had reduced the amount...
Climate change driving world towards food crunch
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Agence France-Presse: Surging population growth and climate change are driving the planet towards episodes of worsening hunger which only an overhaul of the food system will fix, a panel of experts said on Wednesday.
"In the 21st century, as we are now we've got a major set of converging threats,' said John Beddington, a British professor who chaired a 13-member nine-month probe.
"There's population growth, unsustainable resource use and big pressures on humanity to transform the way that we use food,'...
Large differences in the climate impact of biofuels, Swedish research finds
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
ScienceDaily: When biomass is combusted the carbon that once was bound in the growing tree is released into the atmosphere. For this reason, bioenergy is often considered carbon dioxide neutral. Research at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, however, shows that this is a simplification. The use of bioenergy may affect ecosystem carbon stocks, and it can take anything from 2 to 100 years for different biofuels to achieve carbon dioxide neutrality.
"Using a tree as biofuel creates a carbon dioxide debt that...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Large differences in the climate impact of biofuels, Swedish research findsConservationists call for urgent restoration of UK peatlands
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Guardian: Conservationists have called for urgent action to restore vast areas of peatland across the UK after an inquiry warned that their fate will have severe implications for the climate.
The report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has estimated that the UK's peatlands and peatbogs lock in about 3bn tonnes of CO2, and are a far more significant carbon store than the country's forests. But they are being damaged so seriously that they are putting the UK's climate targets...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Conservationists call for urgent restoration of UK peatlandsClimate change threatens Nile, Limpopo rivers: Study
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Agence France-Presse: The study raised the greatest concerns for the Limpopo River Basin, including parts of Botswana, South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, and running through a region already chronically dry. Rising global temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns could affect water flows on Africa's mighty Nile and Limpopo rivers, an agricultural research group said Monday. The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, a global think-tank, warned the changes could have major effects for countries...
Erratic, Extreme Weather Puts Climate Change In New Light
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
redOrbit: The first climate study to focus on variations in daily weather conditions has found that day-to-day weather has grown increasingly erratic and extreme, with significant fluctuations in sunshine and rainfall affecting more than a third of the planet.
Princeton University researchers recently reported in the Journal of Climate that extremely sunny or cloudy days are more common than in the early 1980s, and that swings from thunderstorms to dry days rose considerably since the late 1990s. These...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Erratic, Extreme Weather Puts Climate Change In New Light