Professor Jennifer Francis recently presented evidence showing that the loss of Arctic summer sea ice and the rapid warming of the Far North are altering the jet stream over North America, Europe, and Russia and these profound shifts increase the likelihood of more extreme weather. The so-called jet stream has increasingly taken a longer, meandering …
Continue reading Linking weird weather to rapid warming of the Arctic
Category:5 Environment
Farming in the city.
It’s a cute idea and seems to have much merit. Put a fish farm in a shipping container, plonk a hydroponic greenhouse on top and “hey presto” you have a self-contained, eco-efficient food production system that can sit in a small garden or yard behind your house or urban industrial/commercial building. ECF Farmsystems Containerfarm claims: …
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Maps that explain the world
This article in the Washington Post presents 40 maps that explain the world. They are all interesting and easy to digest. The three maps below are examples which illustrate key issues the world grapples with now. This map shows where the wealth is. It shows national wealth and density of people, but not individual income. …
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85 richest people as wealthy as poorest half of the world
That’s a shocking fact. The timing of that headline is appropriate as the rich gather to enjoy the luxuries that Davos, in the Swiss Alps, has to offer the World Economic Forum. Anyone reading this is unlikely to be one of those 85 people, but you are definitely in the top 10%. And everyone at …
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We are still not prepared to pay for our planet.
In the past decade there has certainly been a huge increase in awareness and care about sustaining nature in the face of overconsumption by humanity. Now, most people have heard the terms “sustainable”, “organic”, “eco”, “green” and associate positive initiatives with these terms. Sadly we also associate a cost with these terms, a cost we …
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Lions: And then there were none …
Sadly lions are becoming extinct. You might think that Simba and friends are still roaming the African savanah, but like many large mammals they have been hunted to minimal populations and their habitat decimated by human encroachment. It was inevitable, given the gross overconsumption of nature by humanity, and we might not really care because …
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When glacial melting becomes irreversible.
When glacial melting becomes irreversible it’s not good, and it’s happening now. Three teams that have modelled behaviour of Antarctica’s mighty Pine Island Glacier (PIG) tell the journal Nature Climate Change that, even if the region were to experience much colder conditions, its retreat would continue. The glacier is a colossal feature, covering more than …
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GM corn caused cancerous tumors in the test rats …
… so Monsanto lobbied for a retraction of the evidence. In September 2012, the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology (FCT) published the findings of the first long-term study of rats fed genetically modified corn. The study’s authors, led by Gilles-Eric Séralini of the University of Caen, France, concluded that the GM corn caused cancerous tumors …
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Biosphere destruction is being ignored but happening fast and time is running out.
In Dangerous Global Warming Closer Than You Think, Climate Scientists Say, Scientific American outlines two reports encouraging immediate and extensive action, before it’s too late. The message of the reports is that climate volatility is already here, species extinction is close to a critical level, as are levels of toxic concentrates. They are now talking …
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Fossil fuel subsidies: over $ 500,000,000,000 a year.
That’s about $112 for each adult in the world. It’s a lot of money for any industry. It’s a huge commitment of resources for a sunset industry. Subsidies must be eliminated. The Overseas Development Institute (ODI) report notes that “these subsidies outweigh the support provided to fast-start climate finance by a ratio of 7:1”. That …
Continue reading Fossil fuel subsidies: over $ 500,000,000,000 a year.