Home/Posts Tagged ‘report’
Posts Tagged ‘report’
Climate Change, Politics, Pollution, May 16th, 2012,
Ready for some doom and gloom, alarmist and generally pessimistic news that will either make you want to not care at all (the current favorite option) or join the Dark Mountain Project? Talking about the environment and pretending to be eco-friendly by wearing a ‘Kiss me, I’m Green’ button has apparently not saved the Earth from going to Hell in a proverbial hand basket. Ready for some shocking, but (honestly) to be expected, figures from the new ‘Living Planet’ report compiled by the WWF, the Zoological Society of London and the Global Footprint Network? Let’s get on with the ecocide…
Tags: Living Planet, report, WWF
Conservation, Politics, Mar 21st, 2012,
Justice for Forests, a new report from the World Bank, claims that illegal logging is a $10-15bn (€7.5-11bn) global business. Perhaps the most shocking figure contained in Justice for Forests is that every second forestland the size of a soccer field/football pitch is illegally logged. As much as 90% of all timber felled each year is cut illegally. The report attributes this massive deforestation to organized crime and corrupt officials. A quote from the report (via BBC News): All too often, investigations – in the rare event that they do take place – are amateurish and inconclusive, and the…
Tags: crime, illegal logging, Justice for Forests, Madagascar, report, World Bank
Climate Change, Health, Politics, Pollution, Mar 16th, 2012,
Just as the UN published figures that global access to clean water has improved, already surpassing their goals set for 2015, a new OECD report predicts that air pollution is set to become the leading environmental cause of premature death. So the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, whose raison d’être is economic growth, is warning that industrialization, which has worked hand in glove with economic growth and market-based economics, is killing more and more people by polluting the air. Previous UN figures showed that as the Global population increases, more urbanization occurs and the proportion of urban inhabitants without…
Tags: clean water, OECD, Pollution, report, sanitation, UN
Politics, Pollution, Videos & Documentaries, Feb 29th, 2012,
An independent report on the level 7 nuclear incident at Fukushima, Japan, following the tsunami on March 11, 2011, reveals bad communication between authorities and irresponsible behavior by Japanese government officials. The report was carried out by the Rebuild Japan Initiative Foundation, who interviewed some 300 politicians, bureaucrats and workers who were involved in the Fukushima disaster. Lies about the level of risk, a lack of information provided to the public and general incompetence reflect poorly on Japan’s government, energy industry and nuclear energy as a whole. From Japan Times: The panel’s report reveals that although the public was being…
Tags: disaster, Fukushima, nuclear, report
Climate Change, Politics, Jan 30th, 2012,
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon’s High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability is presenting its report today in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to address global problems of growing inequality, economic instability and environmental crisis. The report, entitled Resilient People, Resilient Planet: A Future Worth Choosing ‘contains 56 recommendations to put sustainable development into practice and to mainstream it into economic policy as quickly as possible’. From the report: The signposts are clear: We need to change dramatically, beginning with how we think about our relationship to each other, to future generations, and to the eco-systems that support us. Our mission…
Tags: fossil fuels, global, report, Resilient People Resilient Planet, sustainability, UN
Climate Change, Pollution, Wildlife & Flora, Jun 21st, 2011,
“Shocking”, “unprecedented”, “catastrophic” – some of the words being used to describe the state of the Earth’s oceans and where things are headed, in light of a new study by Ipso, the International Programme on the State of the Ocean. Factors such as overfishing, massive agricultural and chemical pollution, warming temperatures and acidification due climate change are combining to cause mass extinction in the Earth’s oceans. Marine scientists believe these factors are working in tandem to create conditions seen in previous mass extinctions. From the Guardian: In recent years, human effects on the oceans have increased significantly. Overfishing has cut…
Tags: agricultural pollution, emissions, extinction, ipso, ocean acidification, oceans, overfishing, plastic, report, study
Climate Change, May 9th, 2011,
As the climate changes and parts of the Earth get hotter, drier summers, while others flood, what really worries me is how this heat will affect my wireless internet connection. Death, destruction, crop failures, horrible diseases and sinking islands will not matter if I can’t get a good wi-fi signal. This is the spin given in a piece for the Telegraph regarding a recent speech by UK Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman: She warned of intense rainfall, droughts and heatwaves in the next 50 to 100 years because of man-made global warming. The signal from wi-fi cannot travel as far when…
Tags: Caroline, Climate change, Europe, global warming, IPCC, report, Spelman, UK, wi-fi
Climate Change, Green living, Sep 30th, 2010,
A new Danish report states that the Scandinavian country could produce all of its energy without fossil fuels within 40 years. The report, by the government of Denmark’s climate commission, cites the rising cost of oil and gas coupled with the lowering prices of renewable energy. From an article in the Guardian: The report will also send a very clear and important signal to other countries that wind is a sustainable source of energy for future development. This is a great opportunity to solidify Denmark’s reputation as a laboratory for green, CO2-free power technology solutions that are globally required. –Vestas…
Tags: Danish, denmark, energy, fossil fuel, renewable, report
Politics, Pollution, Videos & Documentaries, Sep 19th, 2010,
A special report from France24 explores current conditions in the Gulf of Mexico and Louisiana in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. As BP is preparing to permanently seal the damaged well in the Gulf, the local community, environment and economy struggle to recover as oil and dispersant pollution continues to inflict damage. The France24 report explores BP’s ongoing influence in the Gulf of Mexico, including the legal and scientific communities there, the flow of information about conditions on the ground and in the water; and the oil giant’s shoddy, superficial cleanup efforts. Scientists in the Gulf States were…
Tags: BP, France24, Gulf, Mexico, oil, report, video
Climate Change, Politics, Wildlife & Flora, Sep 18th, 2010,
Ireland industrialized and urbanized both later and to a lesser extent than many other European countries. It is known for its beautiful green countryside and pastoral villages and is considered to have low pollution levels in terms of water and air quality. Yet Ireland lost most of its forestland long ago due to the widespread establishment of agriculture. This put stresses on the survival native species, but hedgerows, riverbanks and other ‘green corridors’ still enable vestiges of Ireland’s native ecosystems to survive. The scale of Ireland’s forests have grown in recent years to cover around 10% of the island, yet…
Tags: Climate change, Comhar, ecosystems, government, green infrastructure, Ireland, Irish, Maguire, report
Climate Change, Politics, Sep 1st, 2010,
In the wake of a summer that spawned harsh heat waves and forest fires in Europe; and catastrophic floods in China, Pakistan and elsewhere in Asia, climate debate is back in the news. Debate about the significance or even existence of anthropogenic global warming featured prominently the headlines last winter during the UN climate conference in Copenhagen, the ‘Climategate’ scandal the IPCC and the Met Office were embroiled in; and when parts of Europe and the US experienced unseasonably cold temperatures. These major events were followed by a relative lull in media coverage of climate issues, punctuated by the odd…
Tags: Bjorn, Climate change, ClimateGate, copenhagen, debate, global warming, IPCC, King, Lawson, Lomborg, news, Pachauri, report, review, science, skeptical
Climate Change, Pollution, Aug 30th, 2010,
Projected astronomic growth in transport and wind energy development during the next 20 years threaten the already imperiled Baltic sea, according to a new report by the WWF. The report, entitled ‘Future Trends in the Baltic Sea’ warns that almost all maritime activity is projected to expand over the next two decades, which will add enormous stresses to the ecosystem of perhaps the world’s largest brackish sea. Many sectors, however, have no strategic growth plans, which makes their futures difficult to predict. From the WWF report ‘Future Trends in the Baltic Sea’: In addition to the pressures from place-based maritime…
Tags: Baltic, ecosystem, energy, growth, report, sea, traffic, transport, warns, wild west, wind, WWF
Conservation, Wildlife & Flora, Aug 25th, 2010,
The British animal welfare charity, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), has published a highly critical report on the treatment of elephants in UK animal parks. The RSPCA report – written by scientists at Bristol University in England – found that elephants at British zoos suffer from a host of health and psychological problems including obesity, obsessive behavior and an infant mortality higher than in the wild. From an article in the Telegraph: Putting them in a zoo makes them obese because they do not eat the right food – they are used to coarse,…
Tags: ban, British, elephants, import, report, RSPCA, UK, welfare, zoos
Climate Change, Nature, Videos & Documentaries, Aug 15th, 2010,
Pakistan, China, Australia, Afghanistan, India, Colombia, Central Europe and the US state of Iowa have all recently experienced destructive, though greatly varied, levels of flooding. According to the prime minister of Pakistan, some 20 million people have already been affected by the floods there, while the UN puts the number at 14 million. The first case of cholera has also been confirmed. Independence Day in flood-hit Pakistan Over 2,000 people have been killed in China so far this year as a result of floods, which have triggered mudslides, buried villages and washed away homes. A further 600 people are still…
Tags: central, China, Colombia, dramatic, Europe, flash, flood, flooding, Iowa, Pakistan, report, video
Climate Change, Science & Technology, Jul 30th, 2010,
A new Met Office report, compiled of several recent studies, documents what scientists consider undeniable evidence of a changing climate and warming planet. 10 indicators of global warming were incorporated in the report, including rising land and sea-surface temperatures, ocean heat, sea levels and humidity; and a reduction in Arctic sea ice, glaciers and springtime snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere. From an article in the Wall Street Journal: The State of the Climate 2009 report, published Wednesday as a special supplement to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, was compiled by 300 scientists from 48 countries and drew…
Tags: change, climate, evidence, global, hottest, indicators, Met Office, record, report, scientists, temperatures, warming
Climate Change, Science & Technology, Jul 29th, 2010,
Last night, I was watching the Weather Channel and something rather interesting was brought to my attention. A new report on Global Warming was published recently. The report was written by more than 300 scientists from 48 countries and confirms what we’ve known all along: Global Warming is here and it’s not going anywhere, any time soon. Although the report (which is the 20th in a series) is mainly about Global Warming, it doesn’t cite any particular causes of it. However, it does make one thing perfectly clear: “Global warming is undeniable.” One thing that was pointed out in the…
Tags: 10 indicators of a warming world, Annual State of the Climate Report, BAMS, Climate change, global warming, NOAA, report, study
Science & Technology, Videos & Documentaries, Weird Stuff, Jul 8th, 2010,
I recently wrote about lightweight manned electric airplanes making groundbreaking 2 and 3-hour flights. As impressive as this may sound, a Swiss solar-powered plane has just demolished these achievements by a ‘comfortable’ margin of 23 hours. On Thursday morning a former jet pilot in Switzerland’s air force successfully landed Solar Impulse, a four engine solar aircraft, near the Swiss capital of Bern. The landing followed an incredible 26-hour long flight; the longest and highest – at 8,700m or 28,543ft – ever recorded solar-powered airplane flight. From a BBC News report: The plane has 12,000 solar cells arranged on its wingspan…
Tags: aircraft, Airplane, cells, flight, plane, report, Solar, Solar Impulse, Swiss, Switzerland
Climate Change, Conservation, Health, Wildlife & Flora, Jul 3rd, 2010,
Joyce Kilmer’s 1913 poem ‘Trees’ was not only sickly-sweet, but also pretty darn apt regarding how important our woody friends truly are. The British conservation charity Woodland Trust has published a report detailing the important role of native trees in urban environments. The report, entitled, ‘Greening the concrete jungle’, claims that more trees and woods in urban areas are needed in order to improve general health and wellness, reduce the risk of surface water flooding, raise the quality of life, support wildlife and enhance conditions for inward investment. Trees are an inexpensive way to provide a diverse range of benefits…
Tags: British, concrete jungle, greening, Health, native, report, tree, trees, trust, UK, urban, woodland
Conservation, Nature, Pollution, Science & Technology, Wildlife & Flora, Jun 25th, 2010,
A shocking report on a Sperm Whale study released today may turn a lot of heads—both pro-whaling and anti-whaling activists alike. The report, issued by conservation and research group Ocean Alliance, shows that high levels of aluminum, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury, silver and titanium are found in tissue samples taken by dart gun from 955 whales, over a period of more than 5 years (starting in 2000). The whales ranged across 87,000 miles, from polar regions to the equator and it’s believed the ingested toxic and heavy metals may have come from humans thousands of miles away. Oh, and don’t…
Tags: aluminum, cadmium, chromium, contaminants, discovery, health hazard, IWC, lead, mercury, Ocean Alliance, pollutants, report, research, shocking, silver, Sperm Whale, study, toxic metals, whaling
Climate Change, Nature, Uncategorized, Videos & Documentaries, Jun 23rd, 2010,
Flooding and mudslides in the northeast of Brazil have resulted in the deaths of at least 44 people, with as many as 1,000 more missing. Torrents following heavy rains over the past three days have swept away some 40,000 homes in the region, displacing 180,000 people. From an Al Jazeera English report: Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the president, has called a crisis cabinet meeting on Tuesday and said the government would make federal funds available to help the homeless. The death toll is feared to rise in the Brazil’s northeastern states of Alagoas and Pernambuco, where the flooding is most severe….
Tags: Alagoas, Brazil, death, displace, flooding, floods, northeast, report
