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Archive for March, 2015
World’s Most Iconic Ecosystems May Collapse Under Climate Change
Posted by Nature World: Brian Stallard on March 21st, 2015
Nature World: Researchers warn that without better local management, some of the world's most iconic ecosystems may collapse under climate change.
It is well known that corals in the Great Barrier Reef, for example, are diminishing due to ocean acidification, and that the Amazon rainforest has been suffering from drought over the last decade. But in order to combat such climate change-related threats, we need to reduce the other pressures they face - for example, overfishing, fertilizer pollution or land clearing....
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on World’s Most Iconic Ecosystems May Collapse Under Climate ChangeUS unveils new rules to govern fracking on federal lands
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 20th, 2015
Guardian: The first major federal regulations on hydraulic fracking were released on Friday by the US Department of Interior. The rules, which apply to all fracking on land owned by the US government, are the first federal standards to regulate the process – by which a mix of chemicals and water are injected into the ground in order to drill for oil and natural gas. The regulations require companies to disclose the specific mix of chemicals they use while fracking, and allow government workers to inspect...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on US unveils new rules to govern fracking on federal landsDeforestation Slowing, But Forests Are Breaking Down
Posted by Climate Central: John Upton on March 20th, 2015
Climate Central: The amount of climate pollution being produced every year by the felling of forests is falling worldwide, but benefits of the heartening decline are being eroded by the worsening conditions of the forests still left standing.
The losses of entire stretches of forests, combined with losses of individual trees from forests that remain, pumped an average of 3.2 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year from 2011 to 2015, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization announced...
Record Number Of Stranded Sea Lion Pups Strains Calif Resources
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 20th, 2015
National Public Radio: There are more than two dozen pens at the Marine Mammal Care Center in San Pedro, Calif., and no vacancy. They're filled with more than a hundred sea lion pups, grouped by health condition.
The pups in the first row of pens are swimming in small pools and sliding across the wet concrete.
"These guys on this half of the facility are actually doing pretty well," says Lauren Palmer, the chief biologist at the center. "They're eating on their own. They're playing. They're porpoising."
It's a...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Record Number Of Stranded Sea Lion Pups Strains Calif ResourcesFor The Love Of Pork: Antibiotic Use On Farms Skyrockets Worldwide
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 20th, 2015
National Public Radio: Sorry bacon lovers, we've got some sad news about your favorite meat.
To get those sizzling strips of pork on your plate each morning takes more antibiotics than it does to make a steak burrito or a chicken sausage sandwich.
Pig farmers around the world, on average, use nearly four times as much antibiotics as cattle ranchers do, per pound of meat. Poultry farmers fall somewhere between the two.
That's one of the conclusions of a study published Thursday in the Proceedings of the National...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on For The Love Of Pork: Antibiotic Use On Farms Skyrockets WorldwideObama admin’s new fracking rules are just too weak, enviros say
Posted by Grist: John Light on March 20th, 2015
Grist: The Obama administration rolled out fracking rules today that will regulate about 100,000 oil and gas wells on public and tribal lands. The rules come after a long process, initiated in Obama’s first term, to regulate the now-booming industry, and attracted more than 1.5 million comments from the public and interested groups.
The new regulations, which were issued by the Department of the Interior, will go into effect in 90 days, and are aimed at wells spread over 750 million acres of public and...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Obama admin’s new fracking rules are just too weak, enviros sayForests shrink; 70 percent less 1 km from edge
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 20th, 2015
Reuters: Farms, roads and towns are fast slicing up the world's wilderness, leaving 70 percent of the world's remaining forested land less than one km (half a mile) from a forest edge, a U.S.-led study showed on Friday.
The report, by two dozen researchers on five continents and using data the covers the past 35 years, said a rising human population was putting more pressure on forest animals and plants, which suffer greater risk of extinction as their habitats become fragmented.
"We found the results...
New Fracking Rules on Public Lands ‘A Giveaway to Oil and Gas Industry,’ Advocates Say
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 20th, 2015
EcoWatch: Earlier this week, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell said that the new regulations for fracking on federal lands from the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) would be released “within the next few days,” following a four-year process that included receiving more than 1.5 million public comments. Today she unveiled those new rules, which take effect in 90 days. The BLM claimed they would “support safe and responsible hydraulic fracturing on public and American Indian...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on New Fracking Rules on Public Lands ‘A Giveaway to Oil and Gas Industry,’ Advocates SaySome Anxiety, But No Slowdown For North Dakota Oil Boom Town
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 20th, 2015
National Public Radio: Low oil prices are causing a drop in new drilling and exploration in North Dakota, but not as much as you might expect.
Take the boom town of Watford City, over in the northwestern corner of the state and in the heart of the Bakken oil patch. Its population has tripled since 2010, and today, continues to climb.
A massive oil boom is dramatically transforming North Dakota's western plains.
When I visited a year ago for our series on the Great Plains Oil Rush, the price of oil was above $100...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Some Anxiety, But No Slowdown For North Dakota Oil Boom TownGlacial Melt and Precipitation Create Massive Runoff in Gulf of Alaska
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 20th, 2015
Yale Environment 360: Rapidly melting glaciers, rain, and snow are combining to dump a massive amount of freshwater into the Gulf of Alaska, with important implications for ocean chemistry and marine biology, according to a new study. So much meltwater is now flowing into the Gulf of Alaska that if all the streams and other runoff sources were combined it would create the world’s sixth-largest coastal river, according to research in The Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans. The collective discharge into the Gulf of...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Glacial Melt and Precipitation Create Massive Runoff in Gulf of Alaska