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Archive for December, 2012
Climate data ‘has helped African farmers boost production’
Posted by SciDevNet: Lala Cissokho on December 27th, 2012
SciDevNet: Farming communities in Africa are benefitting from an exchange programme to improve access to, and understanding of, climate science, according to a report presented at a seminar.
The seminar, held in in Dakar, Senegal, last month (20--21 November), discussed the results of the programme -- which encompassed two demonstration studies in Kenya and Senegal -- and identified the opportunities and challenges faced in making better use of short-range forecasts and early-warning systems for flooding....
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Comments Off on Climate data ‘has helped African farmers boost production’Britain suspends exploratory drilling of Antarctic lake
Posted by Reuters: Dasha Afanasieva on December 27th, 2012
Reuters: An ambitious British plan to search for minute forms of life in an ancient lake beneath Antarctica's ice has been suspended because of technical problems, the scientist leading the project said on Thursday.
In a move that clears the way for U.S. and Russian teams to take the lead, Professor Martin Siegert said technical problems and a lack of fuel had forced the closure on Christmas Day of the 7-million-pound ($11 million) project, which was looking for life forms and climate change clues in the...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Britain suspends exploratory drilling of Antarctic lakeAverage Temperatures in West Antarctica Show Marked Rise Over 54 Years
Posted by Environmental News Network: Roger Greenway on December 27th, 2012
Environmental News Network: Global average temperatures are rising in most places, but the rise is not uniform. In western Antarctica, temperatures have risen significantly over an extended period. In a finding that raises further concerns about the future contribution of Antarctica to sea level rise, a new study by the University of Colorado University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in Boulder finds that the western part of the continent's ice sheet is experiencing nearly twice as much warming as previously thought....
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Average Temperatures in West Antarctica Show Marked Rise Over 54 YearsGroup Collecting DNA Codes of Endangered Species Gets Google Boost
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 27th, 2012
Yale Environment 360: The Consortium for the Barcode of Life (CBOL), a global initiative assembling the “DNA barcodes” of the world’s endangered species, received $3 million from Google this month to create an online database organizers hope will emerge as a critical tool in the enforcement of international wildlife protection laws. Since it was formed in 2004, the consortium’s 200 participating organizations have collected genetic information for more than 100,000 species. With tens of thousands of species currently...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Group Collecting DNA Codes of Endangered Species Gets Google BoostAmazon Regional Alliance to Confront the Climate Emergency
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 27th, 2012
Inter Press Service: "When someone in Peru sneezes, someone in Brazil catches a cold. When a barrel of oil is produced in Ecuador, a neighbouring country ends up buying it," says prominent environmentalist Yolanda Kakabadse.
Everything that happens in Latin American countries is closely connected, as if they were vital organs shared by the same body, maintains Kakabadse, former environment minister of Ecuador and current regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean of the Climate and Development Knowledge...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Amazon Regional Alliance to Confront the Climate EmergencyHuman evolution driven by sudden climate change
Posted by TG Daily: Kate Taylor on December 27th, 2012
TG Daily: Erratic changes in the East African climate around two million years ago may have been the driving force behind human evolution, say researchers at Penn State and Rutgers University.
Scientists have long been aware that, around this time, the environment gradually dried out, in a process that took up to three million years. But, says the team, this wasn't a steady process: instead, the environment was highly variable.
"The landscape early humans were inhabiting transitioned rapidly back and...
Loss of microbes in deforestation harming Amazon
Posted by Indo Asian News Service: None Given on December 27th, 2012
Indo Asian News Service: Researchers have sounded alarm bells over the loss of microbes helping preserve the Amazon ecosystem following its systematic deforestation. "We found that after rainforest conversion to agricultural pastures, bacterial communities were significantly different from those of forest soils," said Klaus Nusslein from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, an expert in tropical rain forest microbial soil communities, who led the microbiologists. Nusslein and colleagues studied a large farm site over...
Little Oversight for Enbridge Pipeline Route that Skirts Lake Michigan
Posted by Inside Climate News: David Hasemyer and Lisa Song on December 27th, 2012
Inside Climate News: In the northwestern corner of Indiana a major pipeline project is planned that will carry vast quantities of heavy Canadian crude oil across four rivers that flow into Lake Michigan, where 10 million people get their drinking water. The pipeline will cross one river just 11 miles from the lake. It crosses the other three rivers less than 20 miles from the lake. Because the pipeline runs so close to Lake Michigan—and because it is being built by a company with a history of pipeline spills in the...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Little Oversight for Enbridge Pipeline Route that Skirts Lake MichiganIn 2012, Canada’s ‘Dilbit’ Becomes a Contentious American Issue
Posted by Inside Climate News: Lisa Song on December 27th, 2012
Inside Climate News: This was the year "dilbit" registered on the U.S. political and public radar in a major way. Previously just a technical industry term, dilbit—short for diluted bitumen—became the center of citizens' concerns about the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline. Bitumen is a heavy crude oil mined from Canada's oil sands region. The bitumen is so thick that it must be diluted with liquid chemicals before it can flow through pipelines—hence the term dilbit. Environmental groups have long opposed oil...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on In 2012, Canada’s ‘Dilbit’ Becomes a Contentious American IssueCanada: Kinder Morgan takes its case for a pipeline to the people
Posted by Vancouver Sun: Gordon Hamilton on December 27th, 2012
Vancouver Sun: Five years ago, when Greg Toth was working on a Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion project along the Alberta-B.C. border, the terms public engagement and consultation meant talking to a handful of landowners, holding open houses in pipeline-friendly communities and meeting with people who were mostly pleased over the employment that came along with the project. It was a relatively small project to twin the pipeline between Hinton, AB., through Jasper National Park and Mount Robson Provincial Park...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Canada: Kinder Morgan takes its case for a pipeline to the people