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Archive for August, 2014
Food is the ultimate security need, new map shows
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 27th, 2014
Guardian: It is a graphic demonstration of the sickening, symbiotic relationship between hunger and conflict and highlights food supply problems from Somalia to India to Spain Share Tweet this Email Sub-saharan Africa dominates a new food security risk map, while the Indian sub-continent and Iberian peninsula also stand out Map: Maplecroft
A new map of food security risk around the world is, in some ways, depressingly familiar. Sub-saharan Africa leaps out as the place where the most people fear for their...
The Earth Can Support More Plant Life Than Previously Thought
Posted by Nature World: None Given on August 26th, 2014
Nature World: Researchers have concluded that the planet can support a lot more plant life than experts once thought, even in its current state, according to a recent study.
The study, published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology, details how the "theoretical limit of terrestrial plant productivity" - that is, not exclusively crop yeild, but tree and flower growth as well - has been severely underestimated in the past.
"When you try to estimate something over the whole planet, you have to...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on The Earth Can Support More Plant Life Than Previously ThoughtDrought Causes Western US to Rise
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 26th, 2014
Environmental News Network: Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego discovered that the growing, broad-scale loss of water is causing the entire western U.S. to rise up while investigating ground-positioning data from GPS stations.
Scripps researchers Adrian Borsa, Duncan Agnew, and Dan Cayan found that the water shortage is causing an "uplift" effect up to 15 millimeters (more than half an inch) in California's mountains and on average four millimeters (0.15 of an inch) across the west. From the...
Climate Change Impacts Already ‘Inevitable,’ May Soon Be ‘Irreversible’
Posted by Newsweek: None Given on August 26th, 2014
Newsweek: The effects of climate change will be “severe, pervasive and irreversible” within the next few decades if countries burn more than just one-quarter of the fossil fuel reserves already found, according to a major new U.N. draft report. Already, failure to heed earlier scientific advice regarding fossil fuel emissions have “made large-scale climatic shifts inevitable,” but a significant reduction of emissions now could still slow these changes, and buy the human race some time to adapt to an altered...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Climate Change Impacts Already ‘Inevitable,’ May Soon Be ‘Irreversible’Science group says climate change worsening, dangerous
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 26th, 2014
USA Today: Human influence on the planet's climate is clear and having "widespread and consequential impacts on human and natural systems," some of which may be irreversible, says a draft report out today from a United Nations science panel.
"Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia," the report says. "The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, and sea level has risen."...
Goldilocks Plant Growth May Make River Deltas Resilient
Posted by Nature World: None Given on August 26th, 2014
Nature World: Research by Indiana University geologists suggests that goldilocks plant growth - not too little and not too much - may make river deltas resilient to environmental factors that threaten their existence.
This "just right" amount of vegetation is the most effective way of stabilizing these freshwater areas, such as those near the mouth of the Mississippi River, which are under threat as sea levels rise.
Vegetation on marsh surfaces in river deltas can slow the flow of water and cause more sediment...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Goldilocks Plant Growth May Make River Deltas ResilientBills to regulate California groundwater use opposed by farmers
Posted by Reuters: Joaquin Palomino on August 25th, 2014
Reuters: A package of bills aimed at regulating drought-parched California's stressed groundwater supplies has come under fire from agricultural interests, injecting doubt into the measures' fates in the waning days of the state's legislative session this week.
The bills, which would allow the state to take over management of underground aquifers and water accessed via wells, tighten oversight of water at a time when groundwater levels are shrinking in the third year of a catastrophic drought.
“If we...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Bills to regulate California groundwater use opposed by farmers‘Most Endangered’ River in the Nation
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on August 25th, 2014
EcoWatch: The organization American Rivers has distinguished the San Joaquin River of California with the dubious title of "most endangered" river in the nation. Since 2009 the stream has been celebrated as a path-breaking example of restoration--status that could now be threatened.
This artery of California`s Central Valley and important supplier of water to southern California begins in high Sierra wonderlands south of Yosemite National Park and in the breathtaking Evolution Valley of Kings Canyon National...
Earthquake, Drought and Wildfires Ravage California
Posted by EcoWatch: Anastasia Pantsios on August 25th, 2014
EcoWatch: We probably can`t blame the earthquake that hit California`s Napa Valley this weekend on climate change. But it`s one more thing that the beleaguered residents of the so-called "Golden State" have to deal with. And while we can`t do much to address the fact that the state sits on geographical fault lines, other issues have a human element.
The magnitude 6.0 earthquake, which occurred early Sunday morning, is the largest to hit the state since 1989′s Loma Prieta quake. It injured several...
Mideast Water Wars: In Iraq, A Battle for Control of Water
Posted by Yale Environment 360: Fred Pearce on August 25th, 2014
Yale Environment 360: There is a water war going on in the Middle East this summer. Behind the headline stories of brutal slaughter as Sunni militants carve out a religious state covering Iraq and Syria, there lies a battle for the water supplies that sustain these desert nations.
Blood is being spilled to capture the giant dams that control the region’s two great rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates. These structures hold back vast volumes of water. With their engineers fleeing as the Islamic State (ISIS) advances, the...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Mideast Water Wars: In Iraq, A Battle for Control of Water