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Archive for March 21st, 2013
Cracking Open a Cancer Cluster
Posted by OnEarth: Elizabeth Royte on March 21st, 2013
OnEarth: Toms River, New Jersey, wasn’t polluted in a day. Ciby-Geigy and Union Carbide dumped their wastes in this small coastal town for decades before scores of local children were diagnosed with leukemia and cancers of the central nervous system. Dan Fagin’s Toms River tells the story of this chemical production and disposal, of snaking plumes of carcinogens, and of factory workers and residents who cried foul while government regulators and politicians turned their backs on mountains of circumstantial...
Drought and Floods in NOAA’s ‘Mixed Bag’ Spring Outlook
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 21st, 2013
Climate Central: The West and South will continue to face more drought this spring, while the Midwest is likely to see heavy rains and some serious flooding as the northern snowpack melts, according to a seasonal forecast released by the U.S. government on Thursday.
The Seasonal Outlook, a product of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) provides national forecasts for temperature, precipitation, droughts and flood risks for the months of April, May and June, in order to help the public better...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Drought and Floods in NOAA’s ‘Mixed Bag’ Spring OutlookScientists discover two new remarkably-colored lizards in the Peruvian Amazon
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 21st, 2013
Mongabay: Scientists have discovered two new species of woodlizards from the Peruvian Amazon. Woodlizards, in the genus Enyalioides, are little-known reptiles with only 10 described species found in South and Central America. Described in a new paper in ZooKeys, both new woodlizards were found in Cordillera Azul National Park, the nations third-largest.
"These species were discovered in recent expeditions to poorly explored areas on both sides of the Andes in Ecuador and Peru, suggesting that more species...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Scientists discover two new remarkably-colored lizards in the Peruvian AmazonState Dept. hid contractor’s ties to Keystone XL pipeline company
Posted by Grist: Andy Kroll on March 21st, 2013
Grist: Late on a Friday afternoon in early March, the State Department released a 2,000-page draft report downplaying the environmental risks of the northern portion of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, which would ferry oil from Canada`s tar sands to refineries in Texas, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma. But when it released the report, the State Dept. hid an important fact from the public: Experts who helped draft the report had previously worked for TransCanada,...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on State Dept. hid contractor’s ties to Keystone XL pipeline companyDrilling Companies Hope Fracking ‘Truce’ Will Ease Relationship With Environmentalists
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 21st, 2013
National Public Radio: A group of environmentalists and drilling companies has crafted a truce of sorts over the rapid spread of natural gas production in the Appalachian Basin. Four major drilling companies and several environmental groups have agreed on 15 voluntary standards for cleaner drilling practices.
The practices of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing - when companies inject water laced with chemicals deep underground to split open rock formations and get the gas to flow faster - are transforming...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Drilling Companies Hope Fracking ‘Truce’ Will Ease Relationship With EnvironmentalistsDrought that ravaged US crops likely to worsen in 2013, forecast warns
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 21st, 2013
Guardian: The historic drought that laid waste to America's grain and corn belt is unlikely to ease before the middle of this year, a government forecast warned on Thursday.
The annual spring outlook from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted hotter, drier conditions across much of the US, including parts of Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, where farmers have been fighting to hang on to crops of winter wheat.
The three-month forecast noted an additional hazard, however, for the midwest:...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Drought that ravaged US crops likely to worsen in 2013, forecast warnsTheory That Biodiversity Can Reduce Disease Is An “Oversimplification” Say Researchers
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 21st, 2013
RedOrbit: Despite the predictions of a popular theory, maintaining biodiversity in an ecosystem does not necessarily reduce the transmission of diseases from animals to humans, say researchers from the Stanford University Woods Institute for the Environment.
Writing in the journal Ecology Letters, co-authors James Holland Jones and Dan Salkeld challenge what is known as the dilution effect – a widely held hypothesis claiming that the risk of human illness resulting from animal pathogens decreases as the...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Theory That Biodiversity Can Reduce Disease Is An “Oversimplification” Say ResearchersDebate over Colorado drilling regulations begins
Posted by Associated Press: Kristen Wyatt on March 21st, 2013
Associated Press: Oil and gas drilling started to come under review Thursday by Colorado lawmakers, who are poised to abandon their traditional hands-off role and take up a raft of measures to tell state regulators how drilling should be controlled.
First, a House panel signed off on a dramatic increase to the maximum daily fines for drilling infractions, from $1,000 to $15,000. Another committee approved a bill to require each oil and gas location to be inspected at least once a year, a significant increase. ...
‘Erin Brockovich’ town still has toxic water
Posted by Mother Nature Network: Lilit Marcus on March 21st, 2013
Mother Nature Network: In the movie "Erin Brockovich," which won Julia Roberts an Oscar for her portrayal of the titular single-mom-turned-environmental-activist, the heroine takes on an energy company for poisoning the water in Hinkley, Calif. At the end of the movie, Brockovich brings the company down and saves her town. Real life, though, is rarely so simple. PBS NewsHour recently went to Hinkley to see how the town was doing 13 years after Hollywood made it famous. Reporter Miles O’Brien spoke to residents who said...
Pakistan: Record rains ease Islamabad’s water shortage
Posted by AlertNet: None Given on March 21st, 2013
AlertNet: Islamabad is enjoying abundant water supplies for the first time in a dozen years after record winter rainfall. But experts warn that reforestation and better water management are needed in the long term for the Pakistani capital's growing population.
Musarat Aftab is exhilarated that after years of water shortages she will no longer have to do without a piped water supply, now that the dam that supplies Islamabad is filling.
The 40-year-old beautician lives in a two-story house in Islamabad's...