Environment

WASHINGTON – Animals and plants in danger of becoming extinct could lose the protection of government experts who make sure that dams, highways and other projects don't pose a threat, under a r … [Read more]

Google, the Internet search and advertising giant, is increasingly looking to the energy sector as a potential business opportunity. From its beginning, the company has invested millions of dollars in making its own power-hungry data centers more efficient. Its philanthropic arm has made small investments in clean energy technologies.

But in recent weeks, Eric E. Schmidt, Google’s chief executive, has hinted at the company’s broad interest in the energy business. He also joined Jeffrey R. Immelt, General Electric’s chief executive, to announce that they would collaborate on policies and technologies aimed at improving the electricity grid. The effort could include offering tools for consumers. Meanwhile, engineers at Google are hoping to unveil soon tools that could help consumers make better decisions about their energy use. … [Read more]

The 11th Hour is a new documentary from Leonardo DiCaprio about the state of humanity and the world. Join the action at www.11thhouraction.com … [Read more]

MOSCOW (AFP) – Polar bears are dying out in the remote Arctic region of Chukotka because of melting ice and increased killing by humans, an e … [Read more]

Climate change is happening much faster than the world's best scientists predicted and will wreak havoc unless action is taken on a global scale, a new report warns.

'Extreme weather events' such as the hot summer of 2003, which caused an extra 35,000 deaths across southern Europe from heat stress and poor air quality, will happen more frequently.

Britain and the North Sea area will be hit more often by violent cyclones and the predicted rise in sea level will double to more than a metre, putting vast coastal areas at risk from flooding. … [Read more]

Why are oil and gas prices so high?

Who's really controlling those prices?

How much oil is left?

How far will Big Oil go to get it? … [Read more]

A survey, released in Barcelona at the World Conservation Congress, evaluates the status of the world's … [Read more]

Provocative, personal, and inspirational, The Green Collar Economy is not a dire warning but rather a substantive and viable plan for solving the biggest issues facing the country—the … [Read more]

ON A wide, flat plain in Germany's depressed north-east, one of the keys to our future has begun turning. … [Read more]

NOT everyone in Rio de Janeiro has taken to the penguins like Cecilia Breves has, but even for her, there is a learning curve. … [Read more]

Irena Salina's award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st Century - The World Water Crisis.

Salina builds a case against the growing privatization of the world's dwindling fresh water supply with an unflinching focus on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel.

Interviews with scientists and activists intelligently reveal the rapidly building crisis, at both the global and human scale, and the film introduces many of the governmental and corporate culprits behind the water grab, while begging the question "CAN ANYONE REALLY OWN WATER?"

Beyond identifying the problem, FLOW also gives viewers a look at the people and institutions providing practical solutions to the water crisis and those developing new technologies, which are fast becoming blueprints for a successful global and economic turnaround.

In the New York Review of Books, George Soros asks "The rising cost of oil, coming on top of the credit crisis, has slowed the world economy and reinforced the prospect of a recession in the US. The principal question is whether the sharp oil price increase is a speculative bubble or simply reflects fundamental factors such as rapidly rising demand from developing nations and an increasingly limited supply, caused by the dwindling availability of easily extractable oil reserves. The second question is related to the first. If the oil price increase is at least partly a result of speculation, what kind of regulation will best mitigate the harmful consequences of this increase and avoid excessive price fluctuations in the future?"

The following is adapted from testimony given by George Soros before the US Senate Commerce Committee Oversight Hearing on June 3, 2008. … [Read more]

 If Hurricane Gustav had struck New Orleans with full force, what would that have told us about the scale and speed of climate change? If more of the sea-ice cover in the Arctic Ocean is lost in this year's summer melting season than last year (which was the worst on record), will that convince people that global warming is a real and present threat?
    What should people accept as evidence? And what will they accept in practice?
    For scientists, the most persuasive evidence that global warming is happening faster than the models predict is the accelerating loss of Arctic sea-ice. The National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado, which tracks the summer melt season each year, calculates that the loss of ice cover in the Arctic Ocean has already exceeded that of 2005, the second-worst year since observations began, and may surpass last year's record.
    This is not only bad news for polar bears, since an ice-covered Arctic Ocean reflects most incoming sunlight back into space, while open water, being darker, absorbs most of the sun's heat instead. An ice-free Arctic Ocean changes the world's heat balance and causes faster warming. … [Read more]

It is a land of pristine wilderness, pulsing with life even in the depths of white subzero winter. Entirely unscarred by roads or signs, it is the place in all Alaska where the polar bear most often prefers to den. It is host to more than 180 resident and migratory bird species that journey from six continents and all fifty states to nest and rear their young. Because of the massive herds of Porcupine caribou who converge upon the coastal plain to calve each spring, it is known as "the American Serengeti." To the Gwich’in people, who call the refuge their home, it is "The Sacred Place Where Life Begins."

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a touchstone for all people, one of the few remaining ecosystems on our planet unaltered by human impact, where true wilderness can still be experienced. But now the refuge is showing signs of global warming: immense McCall Glacier, measured to have lost more than thirty feet in depth in the last forty years; the northward march of the dwarf willow, moving at a pace not seen in 8,000 years; the alarming decline of the muskox, forced to forage where their calves are vulnerable to predators. And the refuge is further threatened by oil development, which would forever unravel the delicate pattern of nature found here. … [Read more]

You live in this world. You use oil. You must read this book.

The situation is alarming and irrefutable: within thirty years, even by conservative estimates, we will have burned our way through most of the oil that is readily available to us. Already, the costly side effects of dependence on fossil fuel are taking their toll. Even as oil-related conflict threatens entire nations, individual consumers are suffering from higher prices at the gas pump, rising health problems, and the grim prospect of long-term environmental damage.
In this frank and balanced investigation, Paul Roberts offers a timely wake-up call. He talks to both oil optimists and oil pessimists, delves deep into the economics and politics of oil, and considers the promises and pitfalls of alternatives such as wind power, hybrid cars, and hydrogen. A new afterword brings the book up to the minute. Brisk, immediate, and accessible, this is essential reading for anyone who uses oil, which is to say every one of us.

About the Author
Paul Roberts is the author of The End of Oil, which was a 2005 New York Public Library Helen Bernstein Book Award finalist, and he is a regular contributor to Harper's Magazine. A long-time observer of both business and environmental issues, he is an expert on the complex interplay of economics, technology, and the natural world. He lives in Washington State.

The strongest of hurricanes and typhoons have become even stronger over the last two and a half decades, a new study finds.

A new study finds that the strongest of hurricanes and typhoons have become even stronger over the last two and a half decades, adding grist to the contentious debate over whether global warming has already made storms more destructive.

“I think we do see a climate signal here,” said James B. Elsner, a professor of geography at Florida State University who is the lead author of the paper, being published in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature.

The study, which also found that more typical, less powerful tropical storms had not become stronger over the 26-year period studied, is consistent with other researchers’ hurricane models, Dr. Elsner said.

With oceans expected to continue warming, “one would expect more 4s and 5s,” he said of Category 4 and Category 5 hurricanes, those with maximum sustained winds of at least 131 miles per hour. … [Read more]

Melting ice opens up North-west and North-east passages simultaneously. Scientists warn Arctic icecap is entering a 'death spiral'

Open water now stretches all the way round the Arctic, making it possible for the first time in human history to circumnavigate the North Pole, The Independent on Sunday can reveal. New satellite images, taken only two days ago, show that melting ice last week opened up both the fabled North-west and North-east passages, in the most important geographical landmark to date to signal the unexpectedly rapid progress of global warming.

Last night Professor Mark Serreze, a sea ice specialist at the official US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), hailed the publication of the images – on an obscure website by scientists at the University of Bremen, Germany – as "a historic event", and said that it provided further evidence that the Arctic icecap may now have entered a "death spiral". Some scientists predict that it could vanish altogether in summer within five years, a process that would, in itself, greatly accelerate.

But Sarah Palin, John McCain's new running mate, holds that the scientific consensus that global warming is melting Arctic ice is unreliable. … [Read more]

Public given little time to comment on endangered species rules, critics say

The Bush administration provided insufficient time for public comment as it seeks to loosen rules protecting endangered species, representatives of more than 100 conservation groups charged Friday.

The Interior Department set a 30-day public comment period last week on an administration proposal that would allow federal agencies approving or funding dams, highways and other projects to decide for themselves — without input from government experts — whether endangered species are likely to be harmed.

That's half the time that was originally scheduled in a draft obtained by The Associated Press.

A shorter timeframe would give the administration a better chance of imposing the rules before November's presidential election.

Representatives of 103 organizations urged Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez in a letter Friday to quadruple the time for public comment from 30 to 120 days and to hold public hearings.

An Interior Department spokeswoman, who had yet to see the letter, said Friday that requests for more time are always considered, but that 30 days was not unusual.

A friend of mine lives in a middle-class neighborhood of New Delhi, one of the richest cities in India. Although the area gets a fair amount of rain every year, he wakes in the morning to the blare of a megaphone announcing that freshwater will be available only for the next hour. He rushes to fill the bathtub and other receptacles to last the day. New Delhi’s endemic shortfalls occur largely because water managers decided some years back to divert large amounts from upstream rivers and reservoirs to irrigate crops.

My son, who lives in arid Phoenix, arises to the low, schussing sounds of sprinklers watering verdant suburban lawns and golf courses. Although Phoenix sits amid the Sonoran Desert, he enjoys a virtually unlimited water supply. Politicians there have allowed irrigation water to be shifted away from farming operations to cities and suburbs, while permitting recycled wastewater to be employed for landscaping and other nonpotable applications. … [Read more]