Blogs & Ecology

November 18, 2008
 
 
 

Salmon

Seattle, WA – Today, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) released a biological opinion that sets forth a plan for protecting Pacific salmon and steelhead from three toxic organophosphate pesticides. The decision comes after almost a decade of legal wrangling between salmon advocates and the federal government. 
 
In the biological opinion, federal wildlife scientists comprehensively reviewed [...]

ScienceDaily (Nov. 17, 2008) — University of Iowa researchers and their colleagues have found a way to improve existing estimates of the amount of carbon absorbed by plants from the air, thereby improving the accuracy of global warming and land cover change estimates, according to an article in the journal Science.
By knowing the effects of [...]

Preservation deal revised, now cheaper
November 12, 2008
 
 
 

Miami, FL – Earthjustice commends Governor Charlie Crist for negotiating a revised and cheaper deal to buy critical land from U.S. Sugar for Everglades restoration, despite the nationwide economic downturn.
 
“In a time of financial meltdown, Charlie Crist is managing to pull the biggest land deal in the state’s history out of [...]

Safeguards for Hawai’i’s whales will continue, for now
November 12, 2008
Honolulu, HI — A Supreme Court ruling today regarding harm to whales and other marine mammals caused by the US Navy’s use of mid-frequency active sonar off the California coast will have no immediate affect on a similar Earthjustice effort to protect whales in Hawai’i. The [...]

Earthjustice will be busy helping to clean up damage left from Bush administration
November 12, 2008
Oakland, CA — Over the last eight years Earthjustice has been busy defending America’s environment from Bush administration efforts that favored industry and resource extraction over the environment.
Earthjustice president Trip Van Noppen said, “We won far more than we lost, but [...]

On this week’s episode: Apple greens it up with the new innovative MacBook. Glamour plus camping equals Glamping. Check out the weird in Totally Useless Crap.

The Petroleum Ceiling and the Limits of Growth

ScienceDaily (Nov. 12, 2008) — In a global world, significant factors affect the spread of infectious diseases, including international trade, air travel and globalized food production. “Airport malaria” is a term coined by researchers to explain the more recent spread of malaria to areas such as the United States and Europe, which some scientists credit [...]

ScienceDaily (Nov. 10, 2008) — Billions of tons of carbon sequestered in the world’s peat bogs could be released into the atmosphere in the coming decades as a result of global warming, according to a new analysis of the interplay between peat bogs, water tables, and climate change.Such an atmospheric release of even a small [...]

ScienceDaily (Nov. 7, 2008) — A study reported in Nature disputes a longstanding picture of how ice sheets influence ocean circulation during glacial periods.The distribution of sunlight, rather than the size of North American ice sheets, is the key variable in changes in the North Atlantic deep-water formation during the last four glacial cycles, according [...]

I was lucky enough to see Al Gore at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco this week. Lucky because after all he is the Goreacle, but if you could invite anyone to your post-election victory party, wouldn't Al be at the top of your list? This year's "Web Meets World" theme brought together Internet-industry leaders to explore "how might the Web be used to address the world's most pressing limits." The Goreacle concluded the summit as the last speaker on the last day, but enthusiasm was still high as he was greeted with loud applause and a standing ovation by the digerati in attendance.

ScienceDaily (Nov. 7, 2008) — In submitted testimony to the British Parliament, climate scientist Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution said that while steep cuts in carbon emissions are essential to stabilizing global climate, there also needs to be a backup plan. Geoengineering solutions such as injecting dust into the atmosphere are risky, but may [...]

On this week’s episode: ‘Yes, we can change.’ Obama wins the presidential election and here are our top 5 green dreams for 2009. Zero Pollutions Motors create the car of the future, and it runs on air. And, check out the latest in Green Gadgets.

November 5, 2008
Oakland, CA — “We congratulate president-elect Obama and applaud the choice of the American people to move in a different direction on the environment than that of the last eight years. We may be eight years behind, but better late than never to address the pressing problems of global warming, reliance on fossil [...]

ScienceDaily (Oct. 31, 2008) — EPFL researchers have developed a numerical model that can re-create the state of Switzerland’s Rhône Glacier as it was in 1874 and predict its evolution until the year 2100. This is the longest period of time ever modeled in the life of a glacier, involving complex data analysis and mathematical [...]