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Scientists fly glacial ice to south pole to unlock secrets of global warming
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 27th, 2016
Guardian: In a few weeks, researchers will begin work on a remarkable scientific project. They will drill deep into the Col du Dôme glacier on Mont Blanc and remove a 130 metre core of ice. Then they will fly it, in sections, by helicopter to a laboratory in Grenoble before shipping it to Antarctica. There the ice core will be placed in a specially constructed vault at the French-Italian Concordia research base, 1,000 miles from the south pole.
The Col du Dôme ice will become the first of several dozen...
Plants won’t boost warming as much as feared
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 26th, 2016
Agence France-Presse: Vegetation will release far less extra carbon dioxide in a warming world than previously assumed, giving humans a bit more room in the fight against climate change, scientists reported recently. Despite this good news, efforts to curb greenhouse-gas emissions must still be stepped up to avoid dire climate impacts, the researchers cautioned. Earth`s plants and soil microbes absorb and exude huge quantities of heat-trapping carbon dioxide, the main driver of global warming. Over the course of a...
Botulism in waterbirds: Mortality rates and new insights into how it spreads
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 26th, 2016
ScienceDaily: Outbreaks of botulism killed large percentages of waterbirds inhabiting a wetland in Spain. During one season, more than 80 percent of gadwalls and black-winged stilts died. The botulinum toxin's spread may have been abetted by an invasive species of water snail which frequently carries the toxin-producing bacterium, Clostridium botulinum, and which is well adapted to wetlands polluted by sewage. Global warming will likely increase outbreaks, said corresponding author Rafael Mateo, PhD. The research...
Ancient bones point to shifting grassland species as climate changes
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 26th, 2016
ScienceDaily: More rainfall during the growing season may have led to one of the most significant changes in Earth's vegetation in the distant past, and similar climate changes could affect the distribution of plants in the future as well, a new study suggests. In a report in Science Advances, an analysis was done of mammoth and bison hair, teeth and bones, along with other data. It concludes that a changing climate -- particularly increasing rainfall and not just atmospheric carbon dioxide -- explains the expansion...
Kenya: Greenbelt Movement raises alarm over degradation of Mau Complex
Posted by Citizen: None Given on March 26th, 2016
Citizen: Prominent environmental activist group, The Greenbelt Movement, has come out to strongly condemn the encroachment of Mau Forest.
The movement, which founded the late Nobel laureate Professor Wangari Maathai, has demanded for the immediate stop to the destruction of forests and public spaces in Kenya.
“Kenya is already water scarce and facing the difficulties that will come with a growing population and climate change. We cannot afford to lose one square foot of forest cover!” read the circular...
Scotland closes its last coal-fired power plant
Posted by Grist: None Given on March 25th, 2016
Grist: Scotland may be home to golf, haggis, and Sean Connery - but it`s no longer hospitable to coal. On March 24, Scottish Power shut down Longanett power station, its last standing coal-fired power plant.
Weirdly enough, the act of silencing the plant`s turbines was exactly what you might imagine - granted, it would probably never occur to you to imagine something like this, but if you were going to: A crowd gathered `round a very retro control room as a man pressed a large, red button to the tune...
Italy has just passed a law making supermarkets give their unsold food to charity
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 25th, 2016
Independent: Italy has passed a law which will make supermarkets donate more of their waste food to charities.
The country is now the second in Europe to pass such a law, after a bill was introduced in France in February which fines retailers who throw away unsold food.
The bill received strong support from all parties, and was passed by the Italian parliament's lower house on Thursday. It is expected to get approval from the Senate this week.
Rather than penalising retailers who throw away food, the...
Feds Start Public-Land Coal Review Process
Posted by Hill: Timothy Cama on March 25th, 2016
Hill: Federal officials started the process Thursday toward a comprehensive environmental review of the way the government leases public land for coal mining.
The Interior Department’s notice of intent for a Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement is the first part of what will likely be a three-year process to evaluate how to better account for climate change in coal leasing, something that’s likely to increase the costs of mining coal on federal land.
Officials are also using the process to...
Tropical species are especially vulnerable to climate change
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on March 25th, 2016
PhysOrg: Changes in temperature and weather patterns pose a serious threat to the millions of animal, plant and fungi species found in the tropics. In an article published in Science, lead authors and biology Ph.D. students Timothy Perez and James Stroud explain how species found in environments such as the tropics have lower tolerances to climate change. With greater amounts of thermally sensitive species than environments found at higher latitudes, the threat of global climate change puts tropical species...
Malaysian palm oil giant IOI suspended from RSPO
Posted by Mongabay: Philip Jacobson on March 25th, 2016
Mongabay: The green image of one of Malaysia’s largest conglomerates suffered a major blow on Friday with its suspension from the world’s largest association for ethical palm oil production, the RSPO. IOI Group was one of the founding members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, but it has been suspended over its operations in the Ketapang area of Indonesian Borneo, where three of its subsidiaries are alleged to have violated a raft of RSPO standards meant to prevent rainforest destruction and social...