2007 Seen as Second Warmest
Year as Climate Shifts |
This year is on track to be the 2nd warmest since records began in the 1860s and floods in Pakistan or a heatwave in Greece may herald worse disruptions in store from global warming. "2007 is looking as though it will be the second warmest behind 1998," said Phil Jones, head of the Climatic Research Unit at Britain's University of East Anglia, which provides data to the U.N.'s International Meteorological Organization. full story |
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U.S., Mexico and Canada To Protect
Threatened Monarch Butterflies and Porpoises |
The U.S., Mexico and Canada agreed to work together to protect the monarch butterfly, threatened in Mexico by illegal logging destroying its winter nesting grounds. The nations also agreed to joint efforts to aid the vaquita marina, a gray porpoise native to the Gulf of California. They are sometimes caught in fishing nets and their habitat is damaged by shrimp boats that trawl the sea floor. full story |
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Wider Sale Is Seen for
Toothpaste Tainted in China |
After federal health officials discovered last month that tainted Chinese toothpaste had entered the US, they warned that it would most likely be found in discount stores. In fact, the toothpaste has been distributed much more widely. Roughly 900,000 tubes containing a poison used in some antifreeze products have turned up in hospitals for the mentally ill, prisons, juvenile detention centers and even some hospitals serving the general population. full story |
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U.S. National Bird Soars Back From The Brink |
The National Audubon Society says "citizen science confirms the wisdom of an historic action" that federal officials will formalize today - removal of the bald eagle from the protection of the Endangered Species Act. The nation's oldest bird conservation organization says bald eagle sightings in its century-old Christmas Bird Count reveal that eagle populations are steadily climbing in the lower 48 states. full story |
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Climate Change Threatens
North Africa Food Supply |
A dry spell in Morocco has slashed the country's 2007 grain crop to an estimated 2.0 million tonnes from 9.3 million last year and the government is expected to triple soft wheat imports to 3.0 million tonnes. Rising world temperatures will make such droughts more common, increasing dependence on large-scale, costly food imports in the region. full story |
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Desert Dust Cuts Mountain Snow,
May Spur Warming |
Desert dust blown onto Rocky Mountain peaks has cut the duration of snow-cover by a month or more, and the same thing is probably happening in the Alps and Himalayas, researchers reported Monday. In a phenomenon likely to spur global warming, the reflective white of snow is replaced by darker dust deposits that absorb the sun's rays, heating up the lower atmosphere. full story |
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Agent Orange Disease Back in the Spotlight |
Nguyen Thi Hong, 60, is in the last stages of terminal breast cancer, her legs covered in a scabby rash. Nguyen Van Quy, 52, weighs just 83 pounds because of his stomach cancer. At home in Vietnam, his two children are severely disabled and a third child died of congenital defects soon after birth. Hong and Quy are stopping in 4 American cities this week to drum up awareness for their illnesses, which they say were caused by Agent Orange. full story |
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Rapid Deforestation Poses Warming Threat |
Brown, denuded hillsides dot the landscape, cleared by poor farmers to grow coca or food crops where dense jungle once stood. Topsoil, having lost its protection, washes away under the assault of heavy rain. Deforestation in Latin America and the Caribbean is accelerating and the implications are growing more ominous every year. Scientists say deforestation accounts for about 20% of the carbon emissions that contribute to global warming. full story |
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Climate Change Affecting
Sea Turtle Nesting Habits |
The changing nesting patterns of endangered sea turtles in Guyana, is alerting environmentalists to the impact of climate change on these marine animals. Usually sea turtles nest in Guyana from March to August every year. However, for the last 3 to 4 years, says Kalamandeen, the nesting pattern has shifted from mid-January to mid-July. This may have a significant impact on the hatchlings as food availability may be an issue for them. full story |
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Rich Nations Accused of
Green Imperialism on Climate Change |
Asian business and government leaders accused rich countries of hypocrisy, saying they run polluting industries with cheap labor in China and then blame the country for worsening global warming and climate change. "This is green imperialism," Nor Mohamed Yakcop, Malaysia's deputy finance minister, told a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum on East Asia, a two-day conference in Singapore. full story |
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Toxics Persist in Washington
Rivers, Lakes and Fish |
Toxic chemicals banned decades ago continue to linger in the environment and concentrate in the food chain, threatening people and the environment, according to three recent studies by the Washington state Department of Ecology. The new data on toxic contaminants in freshwater fish and sediments add evidence to the state's push to reduce and eliminate the use of toxic substances. full story |
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Fragile Galapagos Environment in Danger |
The Galapagos Islands may be listed as "in danger" by the world's top cultural body because tourism is threatening the environment of the islands that helped shape Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. Unesco's World Heritage Committee begins a weeklong meeting in New Zealand today and will consider an application from the territory's ruler, Ecuador, to further protect the Galapagos, said the organisation's chairman, Tumu te Heuheu. full story |
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Hope Still Alive for World's Rarest Gorillas |
There are only 300 of them left, but scientists say the situation of the world's rarest great ape is far from hopeless. Menaced by poachers and squeezed by habitat destruction, the Cross River gorilla, Gorilla gorilla diehli, is listed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. The remaining gorillas are scattered in 11 locations along the mountainous border region between Cameroon and Nigeria. full story |
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Antarctic Icebergs Become Floating Islands of Life |
Global climate change is causing Antarctic ice shelves to shrink and split apart, yielding thousands of free-drifting icebergs in the nearby Weddell Sea. The icebergs in the study were up to a dozen miles long and more than 120 feet high, with one extending nearly 1,000 feet into the depths. These floating islands of ice are serving as sanctuaries for ocean life, with flocks of seabirds above and a web of phytoplankton, krill, and fish below. full story |
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Japan Whaling Town Carves First Catch of
the Season, with School Kids in Attendance |
With knives sharpened and school kids watching, one of Japan's coastal whaling towns butchered its first catch of the season Thursday and defended the practice against international criticism. The team in the village two hours from Tokyo pulled two Baird's beaked whales caught the day before onto a landing station with pulleys and ropes, and chopped them into bricks of meat and blubber for sale.
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Warming May Radically Change Ecosystems |
Global warming won't just melt ice caps; it could create whole new biomes, major ecosystem types like forest, desert, grassland, and tundra, say climatologists led by John Williams at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Williams and his team used computer models to predict what will happen to the world's ecosystems as temperatures rise.
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Arctic Spring's Rapid Advance |
Spring in the Arctic is arriving "weeks earlier" than a decade ago, a team of Danish researchers have reported. Ice in north-east Greenland is melting an average of 14.6 days earlier than in the mid-1990s, bringing forward the date plants flower and birds lay eggs. The team warned that the observed changes could disrupt the region's ecosystems and food chain, affecting the long-term survival of some species.
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Orangutans Flee Illegal Loggers
in Indonesian Parks |
Indonesia's efforts to crack down on illegal logging are holding out some hope for endangered oranguntans, the red-haired apes that inhabit the Indonesian rainforest, the UN Environment Programme says. But hundreds of orangutans have fled their homes and ended up in "refugee" camps as illegal logging rapidly destroys the last remaining rainforests of Southeast Asia. full story |
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Expanding Deserts in China Forcing Farmers
from Fields, Sending Sandstorms across Pacific |
Half a century after Mao Zedong's "Great Leap Forward" brought irrigation to the arid grasslands in this remote corner of northwest China, the government is giving up on its attempt to make a breadbasket out of what has increasingly become a stretch of scrub and sand dunes. In a problem that's pervasive in much of China, over-farming has drawn down the water table so low that desert is overtaking farmland. full story |
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The Earth Today Stands In Imminent Peril |
Nothing short of a planetary rescue will save it from the environmental cataclysm of dangerous climate change. Those are not the words of eco-warriors but the considered opinion of a group of eminent scientists writing in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. Six scientists from some of the leading scientific institutions in the US have issued what amounts to an unambiguous warning to the world: civilisation itself is threatened by global warming. full story |
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Global Warming to Multiply
World's Refugee Burden |
If rising sea levels force the people of the Maldive Islands to seek new homes, who will look after them in a world already turning warier of refugees? The daunting prospect of mass population movements set off by climate change and environmental disasters poses an imminent new challenge that no one has yet figured out how to meet. full story |
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Ecuador Weighs Galapagos Turtles vs Tourists |
Marauding Europeans are nothing new to the Galapagos Islands, which long ago were the haunt of English pirates preying on Spanish galleons laden with Inca gold. But Ecuador, which owns the archipelago, may soon have to take action against menacing outsiders, realizing foreigners with cameras are every bit as dangerous as those with cutlasses. full story |
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Zombie Crops Funded by British
Taxpayers to Get Round GM Ban |
"Zombie" GM crops, so called because farmers will have to pay biotech companies to bring seeds back from the dead, are being developed with British taxpayers' money. The highly controversial development, part of a £3.4m EU research project, is bound to increase concerns about the modified crops and the devastating effect they could have on Third World farmers. full story |
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Nearly a Million UK Children on DNA Database |
British authorities have stored details of almost a million children in the national DNA database, including those of children under 10. "The Govt's onward march towards a surveillance state has now become a headlong rush," Nick Clegg said. "As an increasing number of very young children well under the age of criminal responsibility appear on the database it is clear the Government sees no limits to its invasion of our privacy." full story |
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EU Fleet Caught Fishing Illegally One Day
into Bluefin Tuna Recovery Plan |
The Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior yesterday documented illegal fishing activities by the EU fleet, only one day after the new regulation of the International Convention for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna entered into force. ICCAT agreed last Nov. to establish a number of measures to curb illegal fishing, amongst them a total ban on the use of spotter planes. full story |
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Wildfire, Walleyes, and Wine |
Climate change isn't just about the future anymore. The summary begins by emphasizing a flood of new evidence documenting the effects that climate change has already produced. Numerous studies show glaciers melting, permafrost warming, birds nesting earlier in the year, leaf buds popping sooner, fish migrations changing, animals shifting their ranges, and many more events in nature going askew. full story |
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Scientists Examine Cause of Bee Die-Off |
Scientists investigating a mysterious ailment that killed many of the nation's honeybees are concentrating on pesticides and a new pathogen as possible culprits, and some beekeepers are already trying to keep their colonies away from pesticide-exposed fields. After months of study, researchers are finding it difficult to tie the die-off to any single factor. full story |
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Populations of 20 Common Birds Declining |
The populations of 20 common American birds from the fence-sitting meadowlark to the whippoorwill with its haunting call are half what they were 40 years ago, according to an analysis released Thursday. Suburban sprawl, climate change and other invasive species are largely to blame, said the study's author Greg Butcher of the National Audubon Society. full story |
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Drowning in Plastic |
Life on earth depends on little specks floating in the ocean. Tiny plankton convert sunlight to energy to form the base of the marine food chain, sustaining all seafaring creatures, from anchovies to whales and the land-based animals that eat them. But increasingly, researchers are peering through their microscopes at the specks in seawater samples and finding miniscule bits of poisonous garbage instead of life-sustaining mini-critters. full story |
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Bear Cubs Take the Train
Through Canadian Parks |
Three bear cubs have taken to riding the rails in Canada's Rocky Mountains in search of an easy, but dangerous, meal. The black bear cubs, each just a few months old and weighing only about 4 pounds have twice had to be pulled off rail cars after traveling about 12 miles through the mountain passes that separate Banff National Park in the province of Alberta and Yoho National Park in British Columbia.
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India To Appeal To World
To Keep Tiger Trade Ban |
India will appeal to a U.N. wildlife forum to retain a ban on trading in tiger parts, despite Chinese lobbying to legalise trade in organs of the endangered big cats, the government said on Tuesday. China has been pressing countries to support lifting the ban, imposed in 1993, and last week said it would allow trade in parts from captive-bred tigers if a review proved it would reduce poaching and help tigers worldwide. full story |
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Chinese Demand Drives
Global Deforestation Crisis |
"I lack words to describe what is going on here," says Richard Greine, head of the local forestry post, 220 miles north of Cameroon's capital Yaounde. "Both illegal and authorised exploiters have staged a hold-up on the forest." From central Africa to the Amazon basin and Indonesia's islands, the world's great forests are being lost at an annual rate of at least 32 million acres. full story |
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Caribbean Turtles Said To Be
Threatend by Catches, Trade |
Turtles in the Caribbean are under threat from over-fishing and illegal trade, with almost all eggs laid in Guatemala taken by humans, a wildlife trade monitoring network said on Tuesday. Traffic, comprising the WWF conservation group and the World Conservation Union, urged govts in the region to set tighter limits on catches to help safeguard the region's 6 species of turtles. full story |
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U.S. Weighs Reducing Spotted Owl Habitat |
The Bush administration Tuesday proposed cutting 1.5 million acres from Northwest forests considered critical to the survival of the northern spotted owl, reopening the '90s battle between timber production and wildlife habitat on public lands. The owl, which became a symbol of the decline of the Northwest's timber industry, was declared a threatened species in '90 due primarily to heavy logging in the old growth forests where it nests and feeds. full story |
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Congo Rangers Treat Rare
Gorilla Orphaned in Shooting |
National park rangers in the Democratic Republic of Congo are battling to save a 2-month-old gorilla found clinging to its dead mother, who was shot dead through the back of the head. He said the young mountain gorilla, born on April 15 and named Ndakasi by conservationists, had accepted baby formula from a feeding bottle. Mountain gorillas usually suckle for up to three years in the wild. full story |
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Logging May Wreck
Orangutan Forests in a Decade |
Illegal logging could destroy the last forest strongholds of orangutans within a decade and the world should do more to help Indonesia halt smuggling both of apes and of timber. Burning of forests, sometimes to clear land to grow palm oil for biofuels, was adding to threats to endangered orangutans which live on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra. full story |
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Good News, Bad News in
Great Lakes Health Report |
Levels of many toxic chemicals in the Great Lakes are diminishing, yet at the same time new chemicals of concern are being detected, according to the latest joint report from the United States and Canada. The Highlights Report concludes that the chemical, physical and biological integrity of this ecosystem is a mixed bag. Some conditions are improving while others are getting worse, the report documents. full story |
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Canadian Arctic Temperatures
Rising at Double Global Rate |
Coming on the eve of a G8 meeting looking for ways to reduce heat-trapping emissions from industry and automobiles, the UN's "Global Outlook for Ice and Snow" says Canada's Arctic, along with north-central Siberia and the Antarctic Peninsula, has registered the largest temperature increases of any place on Earth. full story |
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Global Warming Melts Andean
Glaciers Toward Oblivion |
Global warming will melt most Andean glaciers in the next 30 years, scientists say, threatening the livelihood of millions of people who depend on them for drinking water, farming and power. Small glaciers are scattered across the Andes and have for long been a crucial source of fresh water in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru, thawing in summer months and replenishing themselves in winter. But global warming has driven them into retreat. full story |
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Gas Plant Sparks Concern for
Rare Hong Kong Dolphins |
Conservation group WWF has made a last-ditch effort to block a proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in Hong Kong, slamming the government for approving an environmental study and saying the project could threaten rare pink dolphins. "If you keep pushing the dolphins like this, at some point their numbers will start to go down."
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Russia Establishes National Park
for Endangered Siberian Tigers |
The Russian government this week created the country's first national park for the Siberian tiger, following years of advocacy and conservation work by WWF and local environmental groups. Russia's Ministry for Natural Resources announced the new park on Tuesday. 4000 miles east of Moscow, the Zov Tigra, Roar of the Tiger, National Park stretches across 200,000 acres of the forested Sikhote-Alin mountain range in the Primorye region. full story |
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Elephant Poaching Said To Imperil Survival |
The markets in the Central African Republic offer all of the jungle's delicacies, including monkey, chimpanzee, antelope and, if you have the cash, even elephant. Most people believe international demand for ivory is the biggest threat to elephants. But while wildlife experts are meeting in the Netherlands through June 16 to discuss the ban on the ivory trade, forest elephants are being hunted to extinction not only for their tusks, but for their meat. full story |
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Crime Syndicates Smuggling Wildlife |
It could be ivory concealed in a container, cans of caviar in a suitcase or baby chimpanzees in a crate. The smuggling of wildlife goods is a low-risk, high-profit enterprise proving increasingly attractive to crime syndicates. Exports of wildlife, including fisheries and timber, are estimated at $150 billion to $200 billion a year. The illicit side of the business is likely worth tens of billions of dollars, experts say. full story |
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Whales Win, Black Rhinos Lose at CITES Meeting |
Japan and Iceland once again failed to remove whale protections, as their proposals to the meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species were defeated today. But the future of black rhinos is at risk after Kenya lost its attempt to repeal hunting quotas granted to Namibia and South Africa for these endangered animals. full story |
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Logging Could Drive
Mountain Caribou to Extinction |
Forty-two biologists and botanists have signed a petition urging the govts of British Columbia and Canada to fully protect old growth forest across the range of the endangered mountain caribou. Unless logging of these forests stops, the species will disappear. Most of these forests are in the Interior Wet Belt of British Columbia, which is inhabited by 98% of the world s surviving mountain caribou, now reduced to fewer than 2,000 animals. full story |
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Thunder? That's The Sound of Greenland Melting |
Atop Greenland's Suicide Cliff, from where old Inuit women used to hurl themselves when they felt they had become a burden to their community, a crack and a thud like thunder pierce the air. "We don't have thunder here. But I know it from movies," says Ilulissat nurse Vilhelmina Nathanielsen. "It's the ice cracking inside the icebergs." full story |
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Group Seeks Ban on Detergent Ingredient |
An environmental group asked the federal government Tuesday to ban a class of toxic chemical compounds that are found in industrial and household detergents and are believed to cause male fish to develop female characteristics. The Sierra Club also asked the EPA to bar the use of these products in areas where wastewater treatment plants aren't equipped to remove nonylphenol ethoxylates, or NPEs.
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In Antarctica, Proof That Action on
Climate Change Is More Urgent Than Ever |
Fears that global sea levels this century may rise faster and further than expected are supported by a study showing that 300 glaciers in Antarctica have begun to move more quickly into the ocean. Scientists believe that the accelerated movement of glaciers in the Antarctic Peninsula indicates a dramatic shift in the way melting ice around the world contributes to overall increases in global sea levels.
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Financial Sector to G8: Deep
Climate Emissions Cuts Needed Now |
As the G8 Summit opens in Germany today, the heads of 23 financial service companies urged the world's eight most industrialized countries to agree on deep cuts in the emissions of greenhouse gases responsible for the planet's rising temperature. They fear that unchecked climate change is likely to lead to an increase in climate-related disasters, with "grave social and environmental harm." full story |
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Climate Change To Hit Bangladesh Food Output |
Rising temperatures will hurt food production in Bangladesh, and millions of people could be displaced as the seas around the low-lying nation rise. "Production will deplete steadily as the climate changes more and more, and by 2015 Bangladesh, along with neighbouring countries, may be forced to look for new brand of crops." full story |
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Miliband Goes to US to Deliver
Ultimatum on Climate Change |
Tensions over global warming between Downing Street and the White House will increase today with a warning by a senior British minister that the US should sign up to UN targets for reducing climate change. The Environment Secretary, David Miliband, will use a speech in George Bush's backyard to warn that the US President's plan for delaying a deal to the end of 2008 misses the point that urgent action is needed now. full story |
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Melting Ice, Snow To Hit Livelihoods Worldwide |
Global warming that is melting ice and snow will affect hundreds of millions of people around the globe by disrupting rivers in Asia, thawing Arctic ice and raising ocean levels, a U.N. report said on Monday. Glaciers from the Himalayas to the Alps are in retreat, permafrost from Alaska to Siberia is warming and snowfalls are becoming unreliable in many regions. full story |
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Indonesia's Forests Threatened
by Logging, Palm Oil |
Indonesia's rainforests, especially those on Borneo island, are being stripped so rapidly because of illegal logging and palm oil plantations for bio-fuels, they could be wiped out altogether within the next 15 years, some environmentalists say. "Sixty percent of the protected and conservation areas are already badly damaged due to illegal logging and palm oil plantations." full story |
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House Chairman Pushes Tougher
Regulation for Wind Industry |
Birds and bats have a powerful advocate in the new Congress, and he is making the wind energy industry nervous. Rep. Nick Rahall, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, is pushing legislation that would more strictly regulate wind energy to protect birds, bats and other wildlife killed when they fly into the giant turbines.
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Tigers on the Way to Extinction, Report Warns |
Wild tigers are on a path to extinction, a new report has warned. Researchers found that the big cats now occupy a mere 7% of their historic range. In just the past 10 years, the territory known to be inhabited by tigers had declined by 41%. "If this trend continues, the current range will shrink even further, and wild populations will disappear from many more places, or dwindle to the point of ecological extinction." full story |
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CITES Permits 60 Tons of
Elephant Ivory to Be Sold | |
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, CITES, Saturday approved exports of 60 tons of elephant ivory from Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa to Japan. The approval comes over the objections of many African elephant range states and conservation groups who say legal trade will give cover to ivory poachers. full story |
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Chinese Anti-pollution Campaigner Tortured |
Police have tortured an environmental activist who for years campaigned against the pollution of China's scenic Taihu lake that is now at the centre of a clean water crisis, his wife said Friday. Activist Wu Lihong was arrested in April on trumped-up extortion charges and has since suffered beatings while in custody, Xu Jiehua told AFP by phone from her home in Yixing city on the west side of the lake.
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Global Warming Is Three Times
Faster than Worst Predictions |
Global warming is accelerating three times more quickly than feared, a series of startling, authoritative studies has revealed. They have found that emissions of carbon dioxide have been rising at thrice the rate in the 1990s. The Arctic ice cap is melting three times as fast - and the seas are rising twice as rapidly - as had been predicted.
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Damning Indictment of China's Bid
to Legalise Its Ivory Trade |
China's attempts to begin a limited legal trade in elephant ivory should be stopped because it has consistently failed to enforce an existing ban over the past 17 years, an investigation has concluded. The Chinese government will begin lobbying delegates to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species this weekend to gain the coveted status of being allowed to import elephant tusks legally from Africa. full story |
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Earth's Climate Approaches
Dangerous Tipping Point |
A stern warning that global warming is nearing an irreversible tipping point was issued today by the climate scientist who the Bush administration has tried to muzzle. "If global emissions of CO2 continue to rise at the rate of the past decade," said Dr. Hansen, "this research shows that there will be disastrous effects, including increasingly rapid sea level rise, increased frequency of droughts and floods, and increased stress on wildlife and plants due to rapidly shifting climate zones."
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Nuclear Fuel Dump in Russian Arctic
in Danger of Exploding |
A nuclear waste dump in the Russia Arctic may be in danger of exploding because of corrosion caused by salt water in enormous storage tanks, the Norwegian environmental group Bellona warned Friday. The three tanks are used to store spent nuclear fuel rods at Andreeva Bay, on the Kola Peninsula of northwestern Russia, just 28 miles from the Norwegian border, the Oslo-based group said in a statement. full story |
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Climate Making Forest Fires Bigger |
Climate change is making forest fires around the world bigger and more intense, increasing the threat to people and the environment and costing countries millions in damage and firefighting expenses, the UN said Thursday. With estimates of firefighting costs ranging from $450 million to $900 million per fire season, some countries such as Canada may no longer be able to afford to fight fires with the vigor that they currently do. full story |
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Ethiopian Elephants, Lions at Risk as Forest Cut |
A thousand rare black-mane lions, an Ethiopian national symbol, and some 300 elephants are in danger after a swathe of forest in their sanctuary was cut down, a wildlife expert said on Thursday. The land was cleared from a conservation area at Midiga Tola, adjacent to the Babile Elephant Sanctuary located 350 miles east of Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Wildlife Association President Yirmed Demeke said. full story |
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