Desdemona Despair

Brazilian fisherman Elson de Oliveira, hauls a dead alligator into his boat at Reis Lake, in Manaus, Amazonas state, on Dec. 3, 2009. Plummeting water oxygen levels due to a severe drought have led to thousands of fish dying along the Manaquiri River. MARCIO SILVA / AFP / Getty Images

The Big Thirsty: From contamination to droughts to just going without, images from the world's water crises via Ketsugami

ScienceDaily (Mar. 30, 2010) — Decades of drought, interspersed with intense monsoon rains, may have helped bring about the fall of Cambodia's ancient Khmer civilization at Angkor nearly 600 years ago, according to an analysis of tree rings, archeological remains and other evidence. The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may also shed light on what drives -- and disrupts -- the rainy season across much of Asia, which waters crops for nearly half the world's population.

Historians have offered various explanations for the fall of an empire that stretched across much of Southeast Asia between the 9th and 14th centuries, from deforestation to conflict with rival kingdoms. But the new study offers the strongest evidence yet that two severe droughts, punctuated by bouts of heavy monsoon rain, may have weakened the empire by shrinking water supplies for drinking and agriculture, and damaging Angkor's vast irrigation system, which was central to its economy. The kingdom is thought to have collapsed in 1431 after a raid by the Siamese from present-day Thailand. The carved stone temples of its religious center, Angkor Wat, are today a major tourist destination, but much of the rest of the civilization has sunk back into the landscape.

"Angkor at that time faced a number of problems -- social, political and cultural. Environmental change pushed the ancient Khmers to the limit and they weren't able to adapt," said the study's lead author, Brendan Buckley, a climate scientist and tree-ring specialist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. "I wouldn't say climate caused the collapse, but a 30-year drought had to have had an impact."

Scientists led by Buckley were able to reconstruct 759 years of past climate in the region surrounding Angkor by studying the annual growth rings of a cypress tree, Fokienia hodginsii, growing in the highlands of Vietnam's Bidoup Nui Ba National Park, about 700 kilometers away. By hiking high into the mountain cloud forests, the researchers were able to find rare specimens over 1,000 years old that had not been touched by loggers. After extracting tiny cores of wood showing the trees' annual growth rings, researchers reconstructed year-to-year moisture levels in this part of Southeast Asia from 1250 to 2008. The tree rings revealed evidence of a mega-drought lasting three decades -- from the 1330s to 1360s -- followed by a more severe but shorter drought from the 1400s to 1420s. Written records corroborate the latter drought, which may have been felt as far away as Sri Lanka and central China.

The droughts may have been devastating for a civilization dependent on farming and an irrigation system of reservoirs, canals and embankments sprawling across more than a thousand square kilometers. The droughts could have led to crop failure and a rise in infectious disease, and both problems would have been exacerbated by the density of the population, Buckley says.

The study also finds that the droughts were punctuated by several extraordinarily intense rainy seasons that may have damaged Angkor's hydraulic system. …

Did Climate Influence Angkor's Collapse? Evidence Suggests Changing Environment Can Bring Down a Civilization

Previous figures underestimated global deforestation rate for the 1990s.

FRA 2010, like FRA 2005, did not directly compile data on deforestation rates, because few countries have this information. In FRA 2005 the global deforestation rate was estimated from net changes in forest area. Additional information on afforestation and on natural expansion of forest for the past 20 years has now made it possible to also take into account deforestation within those countries that have had an overall net gain in forest area. As a result, the revised estimate of the global rate of deforestation and loss from natural causes for 1990–2000 (close to 16 million hectares per year) is higher, but more accurate, than was estimated in FRA 2005 (13 million hectares).

World deforestation decreases, but remains alarming in many countries [PDF: The Global Forest Resources Assessment 2010 Key Findings]

By Bonnie Hulkower, New York, New York  on 03.30.10

TreeHugger has reported in the past about the mysterious honeybee decline due to Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Without any discernible explanation, entire hives of honeybees have been abandoning their hives and dying. There are likely many reasons for CCD, including: parasites, viruses, bacteria, poor nutrition, and pesticides. CCD has destroyed roughly 30% of the hives in the U.S. over the past four winters, a loss of billions of bees. Although there were signs of improvement in 2009, a recent federal survey and scientific report have indicated the problem has actually gotten worse.

An informal USDA survey of commercial bee brokers has shown that one-third of those surveyed had trouble finding enough hives to pollinate California's blossoming nut trees. A more formal survey will be completed this April. According to the Associated Press, Jeff Pettis, research leader of USDA's Bee Research Laboratory in Maryland, has said the problem for honeybees "has gotten so much worse in the past four years." The losses were three times higher than in 2009. One beekeeper shipped his hives from Idaho to Merced, California to pollinate his blossoming almond groves. When he checked on them, he found hundreds of the abandoned and a third of his bees gone.

Furthermore, a new study published last week in the journal PLOS (Public Library of Science) suggested pesticide use may play a larger role than previously thought. The study found that 60% of 259 wax and 350 pollen samples from 23 states had at least one systemic pesticide. The PLOS study found 121 different types of pesticides and metabolites within 887 wax, pollen, bee and associated hive samples. The 98 pesticides and metabolites detected in mixtures in bee pollen alone represented a remarkably high level for toxicants in the brood and adult food of bees. Exposure to pesticides reduces honey bee fitness. None of the pesticides in the study were found tat high enough levels to kill bees, but it is the combination of factors that is problematic. The pesticides are not a risk to honey sold to consumers, federal officials say. …

A Bad Winter and Pesticides Spell More Trouble for Honeybees

By Staff Writers
Port Of Spain (AFP) March 30, 2010

Trinidad and Tobago is facing a crisis in its ongoing water shortage, with consumption levels recklessly high, authorities warned Tuesday.

The Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) cautioned that at current consumption levels, water will not last until the end of the dry season in June.

Despite strict water restrictions on citizens, water levels "are dropping at an unprecedented level in the nation's reservoirs," WASA's Corporate Communications Manager Ellen Lewis told AFP.

Levels at the nation's largest reservoir Arena Dam stand now at 40 percent. Other major dams registered below 50 percent as of April 26. The long-term average at this time of year is 80 percent.

"If citizens continue to consume water at present levels, there will be no more water in the nation's dams by the end of April," warned Lewis.

At an emergency press conference called on Monday, Lewis told members of the media "the water situation was far worse than when we last reported to you."

"The country is now running on just about one third of its water supplies and still has to serve the needs of 1.3 million citizens," she said. …

There has been no significant rainfall on the twin island Caribbean nation, just off Venezuela's coast, since the middle of May.

The latest forecast from the Met Office does not predict "any significant rainfall in the near future." …

Water crisis in Trinidad: authorities

By Barbara Barte Osborn
Bee Correspondent, The Sacramento Bee
Published: Tuesday, Mar. 30, 2010 - 12:00 am | Page 2B
Last Modified: Tuesday, Mar. 30, 2010 - 12:28 am

The Lake Tahoe-area bears are up early, and they're ravenous.

"They feel the warmth and come out of their dens, but there's no natural food for them yet," said Ann Bryant, executive director of the BEAR League, a Tahoe-area group that educates residents on coexisting with bears.

"The grasses, herbs and roots they like are still covered with snow, and there will be more storms," she said. "So they're looking for garbage, pet food and bird food – those are the biggest lures – and empty cabins with food in them."

In recent weeks, bears have broken into 15 homes, all unoccupied, in West Lake Tahoe and Alpine Meadows, Bryant said, and "there have been bear sightings everywhere." …

The bears' early rising is not an anomaly during a warm spring, Bryant said.

"For a good 10 years, they've been getting up a little earlier each year," she said. "We used to have more snow and more cold, so it used to be the end of March or later, but then it was the middle of March and now it starts about the first." …

With hungry bears rising early, Tahoe-area residents put on alert

Lihu'e, Hawaii— Four conservation groups are suing Kaua'i Island Utility Cooperative for killing rare seabirds without a permit, in violation of the Endangered Species Act. The complaint, filed in Hawaii's federal district court on March 24, says the utility's illegal actions "bear substantial responsibility" for the crash of the Newell's shearwater population on Kaua'i, which declined 75 percent between 1993 and 2008.

The suit, filed by Earthjustice on behalf of Hui Ho'omalu I Ka 'Aina, Conservation Council for Hawaii, the Center for Biological Diversity, and American Bird Conservancy, seeks to protect threatened Newell's shearwaters and endangered Hawaiian petrels from death and injury from KIUC's 1,145 miles of power lines and 3,100 streetlights.

The seabirds, which nest only in Hawaii, are killed or injured during collisions with power lines strung across their river valley flyways. They are also attracted to and disoriented by lights, often with fatal consequences.

"Thousands of Kaua'i's native seabirds have perished needlessly because KIUC has refused to take common sense steps to protect them," said Maka'ala Ka'aumoana of Hui Ho'omalu I Ka 'Aina, a Kaua'i-based advocacy group.

In 1995, experts retained by KIUC's predecessor, Kaua'i Electric, published a report identifying measures — such as lowering or undergrounding power lines in key flyways — that are vital to save the Newell's shearwater and Hawaiian petrel. In the intervening 15 years, the utility has failed to implement any of the report's key recommendations.

"When KIUC purchased the utility in 2002, it knew exactly what needed to be done to comply with the law and save Kaua'i's imperiled seabirds," said George Wallace of American Bird Conservancy. "KIUC can't claim ignorance to justify its continued, blatant violations of the Endangered Species Act." …

Hawaiian Utility Sued Over Seabird Deaths: Power Lines Contribute to 75-percent Decline in Shearwaters

Airport delays, rising rivers and about-to-be-broken rainfall records

BOSTON - The second major rain storm of the month pounded the Northeast on Tuesday with what meteorologists said could be record-setting rainfall, sending rivers toward flood stage, closing roads, delaying flights and causing a run on basement sump pumps.

About 1,000 National Guard troops were ready for action in Massachusetts, where emergency management officials were monitoring rivers that were expected to reach flood stage, putting additional strain on residents already weary of dealing with flooded yards and basements.

The storm hit as the region continues to recover from a storm two weeks ago that dropped as much as much as 10 inches of rain. The National Weather Service says more than 11 inches of rain had fallen on Boston as of Monday, and the Tuesday's rain could break the monthly rainfall record set in 1953.

Standing water was pooling on roadways across the region, making driving treacherous and forcing road closures, police said.

Weather-related delays of up to three hours were reported at Newark Liberty International Airport, and two hours at New York's La Guardia Airport, according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

In New York City, a mud slide caused some interruptions on a commuter rail line in the Bronx. …

President Barack Obama issued disaster declarations for many areas of New England to free up federal aid to residents and households for damages caused by late winter and early spring storms. Assistance can include grants for temporary housing and home repairs, and low-cost loans to cover uninsured property losses. …

 ‘Nightmare’ rains drench East Coast

By Mark Grossi / The Fresno Bee
Posted at 10:07 PM on Sunday, Mar. 28, 2010

Scientists have found evidence in Sequoia National Park of a centuries-long dry spell -- and clues about how the Sierra Nevada could be changing.

The researchers studied tree rings on dead giant sequoias, the largest trees on Earth. They found that during a warm, dry period between A.D. 800 and 1300, fires were more frequent, suggesting more fires may be ahead for a Sierra facing similar conditions today.

Their findings have been published in the most recent edition of the journal Fire Ecology, said Thomas W. Swetnam, lead researcher and director of the Tree Ring Laboratory at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Information about how sequoias responded to the 500-year warm spell is important because scientists predict climate change may subject the forest to a similar environment again, Swetnam said.

One lesson: the Sierra will see more fires.

The study also answers doubts about whether there really was a 500-year warm period in the Western United States, he said.

"It is thrilling to see 3,000 years of history recovered from these amazing trees," Swetnam said. "This is the longest tree-ring history that's been established in science."

Swetnam and his collaborators, including fire ecologist Anthony Caprio in Sequoia National Park, focused on samples from 52 dead and downed sequoias in Giant Forest. …

Swetnam said the study shows fire was far more frequent in the sequoias during past warmups than it has been over the last several decades. If the warm, dry conditions continue, it could lead to more catastrophic fires in the dangerously overgrown Sierra forests. …

"The past is not a perfect guide," Swetnam said. "We are in a much different situation now compared to the past. Our point is that it's likely we're heading into something like that 500-year warm period."

Scientists study centuries-long Sierra dry spell

• The number of days with record hot temperatures has increased each decade over the past 50 years.
• There have been fewer record cold days each decade.
• 2000 to 2009 was Australia’s warmest decade on record.

State of the Climate [pdf]

By Jeremy Hsu, LiveScience Contributor
posted: 29 March 2010 08:27 am ET

Mass death among baby right whales has experts scrambling to figure out the puzzle behind the largest great whale die-off on record.

Observers have found 308 dead whales in the waters around Peninsula Valdes along Argentina's Patagonian Coast since 2005. Almost 90 percent of those deaths represent whale calves less than 3 months old, and the calf deaths make up almost a third of all right whale calf sightings in the last five years.

"This is the single largest die-off event in terms of numbers and in relation to population size and geographic range," said Marcela Uhart, a medical veterinarian with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS). She represents an associate director in Latin America for the WCS Global Health Program.

To get to the bottom of the baby-whale mystery, the scientific committee of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) convened an urgent meeting at a workshop in Puerto Madryn, Argentina, this month.

Only a few clues have emerged so far regarding the cause of death, such as unusually thin layers of blubber on some dead calves. Whale calves typically have lower chances of survival during their first year of life, but the high rate of death at Peninsula Valdes is unique.

Southern right whales are baleen whales that filter their tiny prey from the water with their comb-like mouths. They once represented an ideal target for whalers and nearly went extinct, but began to rebound after a whaling ban started during the 1930s. Still, the whales remain listed as endangered and have yet to recover anywhere close to their historic population levels of 60,000 or more. …

Mysterious Whale Die-Off Is Largest on Record via Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

(philstar.com) Updated March 29, 2010 04:57 PM

BEIJING (AP) – Rainfall in southern China provided little respite for millions of residents suffering from the worst drought in a century, a local official said Monday. The army, meanwhile, began delivering water to some of the worst-affected areas.

Teams of workers in China's southern province of Yunnan, which received as much as 1.5 inches (38 millimeters) of water in some areas over the weekend, continued to dig and drill for wells to ease water shortage needs, according to a director at the Yunnan Land Resources Bureau, who would give only his surname Ma.

"It has been the worst drought in 100 years, so it will take a lot more than a few rainstorms to ease it," said Ma. "It has severely dried up our land."

In neighboring Guangxi, which is also seeing its worst drought in a century, two more cities, Liuzhou and Laibin, were added to the list of areas affected by the drought as water levels dropped by as much as 90 percent in some areas, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

About 61 million people have been affected by the drought and 12 million acres (about 5 million hectares) left barren since last year in Guizhou, Yunnan, Sichuan, Chongqing and Guangxi, Xinhua said. …

Drought expands in China despite rain

By Chua Baizhen, Editors: Raj Rajendran, Alex Devine, Bloomberg News

March 29 (Bloomberg) -- Benchmark coal prices at Qinhuangdao, China’s largest port handling the fuel, rose for the first time in 10 weeks after a drought in the south cut hydropower generation and raised demand from coal-fired plants.

Prices for coal with an energy value of 5,500 kilocalories per kilogram rose 0.74 percent to between 675 yuan ($99) and 685 yuan a metric ton as of today compared with a week earlier, data from the China Coal Transport & Distribution Association showed. That’s the first increase since January 11.

The months-long dry spell in southwest China has affected 61.3 million residents and 5 million hectares of crops in the area, according to Xinhua News Agency. The drop in hydropower also caused less electricity transmission from the west to the eastern regions and led to higher output from coal-fired plants along the coast, the association said in a separate report.

Coal-fired power stations may need an additional 35 million tons of the fuel to compensate for a 15 percent drop in capacity utilization of hydropower, Dave Dai, a Hong Kong-based analyst at CLSA Research Ltd., said in a report e-mailed on March 26. …

China’s Drought Raises Coal Prices, Lowers Hydropower

By JESSICA LEBER of ClimateWire
Published: March 29, 2010

SAKAI, Kenya -- No one complained that the rains were late when they watered the parched hills and muddied the roads here in December. Normally, they would have begun weeks earlier.

Villagers were grateful the rain had come at all.

"God is great. After these two seasons of the worst drought, now there is something in the fields," proclaimed Daniel Muthembwa, 76, an elder in this small farming community, a three-hour drive on winding roads from Nairobi. Around him, cornstalks dotted the green slopes and promised relief from the worst dry spell he could remember. Never had two seasons' crops and three years of rains failed so completely, he said.

"Normal" has little meaning in Sakai today. Kenya is struggling to emerge from a drought that put 4 million on food aid last year and saw at least 10 million facing starvation, the highest levels in two decades, according to one report. And while dry spells are old hat in a nation dominated by an arid and semiarid climate, today rising global temperatures are ending what little predictability farmers could count on in the past.

Experts predict climate change will increase Kenya's already tough food security challenges. Its small landholding farmers feed most of the country and also make up most of its swelling poor population. By 2080, the World Bank estimates that African agricultural output could fall by 16 percent.

Recent drought periods have slashed Kenya's gross domestic product by 14 percent, for example. When both crops and livestock herds perished in droves last year, many Kenyans cut down trees to sell firewood or moved to cities in a desperate search for work. Food imports rose, hydroelectric power stagnated, trucks shipped emergency water supplies. Meanwhile, aid supplies were stretched thin. …

Village elders observed the flowering of the baobab tree or the flights of bees to tell them when to plant. Thirty years ago, there were two reliable rainy seasons in Sakai -- the short rains and the long rains. Over time, the latter has become so fickle in effect, the area only has about three growing months a year.

"Now people cannot rely on these signs. They only used to work when the environment was ideal," said Kimei. …

The Struggle of Farming a Land Where 'Normal' Has Lost Its Meaning

28 Mar 2010, 0101 hrs IST, PTI

BANGALORE: Himalayan glaciers retreated by 16% in the last nearly five decades due to climate change, investigations by India’s scientists in selected basins in four states has revealed. The retreat of Himalayan glaciers and loss in a real extent were monitored in selected basins in J&K, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal and Sikkim, under a programme on space-based global climate change observation by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

“Investigations on glacial retreat were estimated for 1,317 glaciers in 10 sub-basins from 1962. This has shown an overall reduction in glacial area from 5,866 sq km to 4,921 sq km since 1962, showing an overall deglaciation of 16%”, says the latest annual report of ISRO. Snow cover monitoring of all basin has been completed, it said.

Atlases for three years are ready and one for the fourth year is being prepared. Modeling response of Himalayan cryosphere to climate change has been initiated, ISRO added. Meanwhile, a study on the impact of temperature and carbon dioxide (CO2) rise on the productivity of the four major cereal food crops — wheat, rice, maize and pearl millet — revealed that yield of all of them showed reduction with increasing temperature.

Assessment after taking field data showed that wheat was the most sensitive crop and maize the least sensitive to temperature rise among the four, ISRO pointed out. Another study for climate change impact on hydrology was carried out using “Curve Number” approach to study the change in run off pattern in India at basin level. “Analysis shows there will be significant increase of run off in the month of June in most of the major river basins”, the 2009-10 report of the ISRO said. ISRO has also observed a strong correlation between agriculture vegetation (mainly rice areas) and methane concentration.

Himalayan glaciers shrank 16% in 50 yrs: Isro

By Janet Larsen
March 25, 2010

…With global average temperatures up 0.5 degrees Celsius since the 1970s, springtime warming is coming earlier across the earth’s temperate regions.  A number of organisms have responded to the warming temperatures by altering the timing of key life-cycle events. The problem, however, is that not all species are adjusting at the same rate or in the same direction, thus disrupting the dance that connects predator and prey, butterfly and blossom, fish and phytoplankton, and the entire web of life.

The timing of seasonal biological events, otherwise known as phenology, has been tracked in some places for centuries. Japan’s much-feted cherry tree blossoming has been carefully recorded since before 1400. The trees showed no clear trend in timing until the early 20th century, when they began to bloom earlier, with a marked advancement since around 1950.

The meticulous records of Henry David Thoreau help us gauge how spring has changed in Concord, Massachusetts, since the mid-1800s. Comparing his notes on over 500 species and subspecies of plants with modern surveys and records in between, researchers found that springtime blooming advanced by an average of one week over the past 150 years as local springtime temperatures rose. …

Exactly how these changing plant communities will interact with pollinators and foragers that may or may not be changing at the same pace remains unanswered. Members of the animal kingdom are responding to warming in different ways. A quintessential early bird, the American robin, now sometimes makes an even earlier springtime debut.  In the Colorado Rocky Mountains, where robin migration is not just south-to-north but also up to higher elevations, the birds have responded to warming in their wintering grounds by traveling to their high-altitude summer breeding grounds two weeks earlier in 2009 compared to the early 1980s. In some years the robins arrive long before the snow has melted—making it far more difficult for this early bird to catch the worm.

For pied flycatchers that breed in the Netherlands, migration timing from their West African wintering grounds has not changed, but earlier spring warming has caused the birds to breed about as soon after their arrival as possible. Unfortunately, their caterpillar food has been able to respond even more strongly, advancing hatching in one woodland by an average of 15 days over two decades, while the birds only advanced by 10 days. At sites where the caterpillar populations still peak somewhat late, flycatcher populations have dropped by 10 percent, but where the caterpillars have advanced hatching the most, flycatcher populations have plummeted about 90 percent.

Across Europe as a whole, populations of birds that did not advance their migration time along with earlier spring warming have shrunk since 1990. Short-distance migrants seem to be faring better than those traveling long ways. …

Earth Out of Sync – Rising Temperatures Throwing off Seasonal Timing

Stefano De Luigi, a VII Network for Le Monde Magazine photographer based in Italy, won the second prize in the Contemporary Issues Singles category of the World Press Photo Contest 2010 for this photograph of a giraffe killed by drought in northeast Kenya. (REUTERS/Stefano De Luigi/VII Network/Le Monde Magazine)

Scenes from Kenya

The relationship between the size of the hypoxic zone in July (km2) and the May nitrate+nitrite N loading (kg N) to the Gulf of Mexico each year. A linear regression of the data is shown. The individual data points are in four chronologically-sequenced groups separated from each other when the data fall below the slope, and whose separation is coincidental with hurricane events. From Turner et al. (2008).

2009 Forecast of the Summer Hypoxic Zone Size, Northern Gulf of Mexico [pdf]

By CalculatedRisk on 3/26/2010 10:00:00 AM

From the BLS: Regional and State Employment and Unemployment Summary

Twenty-seven states recorded over-the-month unemployment rate increases, 7 states and the District of Columbia registered rate decreases, and 16 states had no rate change, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Over the year, jobless rates increased in 46 states and the District of Columbia and declined in 4 states.
...
Michigan again recorded the highest unemployment rate among the states, 14.1 percent in February. The states with the next highest rates were Nevada, 13.2 percent; Rhode Island, 12.7 percent; California and South Carolina, 12.5 percent each; and Florida, 12.2 percent. North Dakota continued to register the lowest jobless rate, 4.1 percent in February, followed by Nebraska and South Dakota, 4.8 percent each. The rates in Florida and Nevada set new series highs, as did the rates in two other states: Georgia (10.5 percent) and North Carolina (11.2 percent). [emphasis added] …

Unemployment Rate Increases in 27 States in February

By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent
Published: 7:00AM GMT 23 Mar 2010

Research in the Congo Basin in Africa found more than three million tonnes of 'bush meat' is being extracted from the area every year, the equivalent of butchering 740,000 bull elephants.

Most of the animals are small antelopes like blue duiker or rodents like the porcupine but larger mammals like monkeys and even gorillas are also taken.

The study published in Mammal Review found the rate of hunting is higher than ever because of malnutrition in the area and is calling for more funding to help the local community find alternative sources of food.

Meat from wild animals or 'bush meat' is one of the most important sources of protein for many people around the world, especially in Africa.

But in a 500 million acre region of the Congo Basin stretching into eight countries, hunting has reached an unprecedented scale.

Researchers from the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) calculated that 3.4 million tonnes of bushmeat is removed every year from that area alone, equivalent to the weight of 40.7 million men. …

Rare animals are being 'eaten to extinction' via Apocadocs

EVEN breathing can be dangerous these days. Air pollution is knocking up to nine years off the lives of people who live in pollution hotspots or have a respiratory illness. So says a report by the UK House of Commons' Environmental Audit Committee.

Tiny particles of sulphate, carbon and dust are the most damaging to health, but nitrogen oxides and ozone also have an effect. The UK is in breach of European regulations for all of these, and could face fines of up to £300 million. Road transport is the main culprit. Power plants also churn out damaging particles but mostly away from cities.

Only a radical shift in transport policy will allow the UK to meet its targets, the report concludes. "But such a shift is unlikely to occur in the next 10 years, unless the government starts taking sustainable transport seriously," says Paul Firmin of the Institute for Transport Studies (ITS) at the University of Leeds, UK.

British air is shortening lives by nine years

Britain's filthy air kills 50,000 people a year – more than obesity, passive smoking or traffic accidents, a damning report by MPs has said.

Ministers have been rebuked for failing to tackle the lethal problem, risking millions of pounds in fines for failing to meet EU quality standards.

MPs on the Environmental Audit Committee warned that climate-change targets were even exacerbating air pollution.

The Government has encouraged people to drive diesel cars which were more fuel efficient but created more particulates, while the introduction of biomass boilers in urban areas also led to air pollution.

Poor air quality is linked to respiratory illness, heart disease and asthma, conditions which can dramatically lower life expectancy.

On average people across the UK lose seven to eight months of their lives because of filthy air. But in pollution hotspots, that rises to eight or nine years.

Despite the devastating consequences, the Government is putting very little effort into reducing air pollution compared to its drive to cut smoking, alcohol misuse and obesity, MPs on the Environmental Audit Committee said.

Tim Yeo, the Tory MP and chairman of the committee, said the Government should be ‘ashamed’ of its inaction.  ‘Air pollution probably causes more deaths than passive smoking, traffic accidents or obesity, yet it receives very little attention from Government or from the media.’

‘In the worst affected areas, this invisible killer could be taking years off the lives of people most at risk, such as those with asthma.’

He added that much more needed to be done to save lives and reduce the ‘enormous burden’ air pollution placed on the NHS. …

Air pollution in the UK 'killing 50,000 people a year', warn MPs

The divine Seba Blanchard helps to promote Desdemona, after a smoking-hot performance at Seattle Center with her troupe, WildCard BellyDance.

Reporting by Neil Marks; Editing by John O'Callaghan
GEORGETOWN
Sat Mar 27, 2010 2:56pm EDT

(Reuters) - Muslims across Guyana prayed for rain on Saturday to end a drought that has battered the tiny South American nation's rice and sugar exports and caused food shortages in indigenous communities.  

The government of the former British colony of about 750,000 people is struggling to irrigate farmland, with water at storage points reaching dangerously low levels.

The Central Islamic Organization of Guyana (CIOG), which represents Muslims in 145 mosques across the multiethnic nation, organized a day of prayers for rain.

"This activity is consistent with the Sunnah of the Prophet Mohammad beseeching the Creator to cause the rain to descend and alleviate sufferings," said one CIOG leader, Shaykh Moeenul.

Muslims make up about 7 percent of Guyana's population, with Hindus at 28 percent and Christians making up most of the rest across various denominations.

Guyana is one of several countries in the region, including neighboring Venezuela, that have been parched by drought since the end of last year.

"The Amerindian communities are really badly hit," President Bharrat Jagdeo said on Friday of the indigenous people who make up nearly a 10th of Guyana's population. "We have been supplying food to some communities but I need to increase that significantly." …

Muslims pray for rain in drought-hit Guyana

ScienceDaily (Mar. 27, 2010) — On 3-4 February 2010, tropical cyclone Oli hit western French Polynesia. From 7 February 2010, the Coral Observation Department at CNRS's National Institute of Earth Sciences and Astronomy (INSU), based at the Centre de recherches insulaires et observatoire de l'environnement (CRIOBE, CNRS/EPHE) in Moorea, rapidly undertook an inventory of the cyclone's effects after it had passed over two reference sites. The scientists were soon to discover the extent of the damage: the coral reef, which had already been made vulnerable by the invasion of a starfish that is a coral predator, had been almost completely destroyed.

On 3 February 2010, tropical cyclone Oli passed by the Leeward Islands, to the west of Tahiti. The islands of Bora Bora, Raiatea-Tahaa, Huahine and Maupiti were subjected to waves six to seven meters high and to wind gusts of 170 km/hour. In the evening of 3-4 February, it was the turn of Tahiti and Moorea (Windward Islands), followed by the island of Tubuai (Austral Islands) to undergo the cyclone's impact, with mean wind speeds of 210 km/hour. Four days later, after repairing the facilities, CNRS's INSU Coral Observation Department based at CRIOBE (1) measured the effects of the cyclone after it had passed over the two reference sites on the north coast of Moorea. The results left no room for doubt: cyclone Oli had planed down the coral populations and finished off a reef which was already vulnerable. In fact, Acanthaster, a starfish that preys on coral, had already decimated the coral populations on the outer slopes of Moorea (2). Although this was a cause for deep concern, the physical structure of the reefs, and especially that of the outer slope (which is the most favorable area for reef growth due to the well-oxygenated water) had nevertheless been little affected, since the skeletons of the dead colonies were still in place, holding out the promise of a possible revival.

However, after the cyclone had passed, the physical structure of Moorea's outer slopes (especially on the northern side) were found to be seriously and lastingly affected. Comparison of data before and after the cyclone struck reveals a very significant reduction in the relief of the outer slope. The rugosity indices (linear distance of developed reef/ linear distance of flat reef) have fallen by 50% at all depths down to 30 meters, as shown by statistical tests carried out at the sites studied. A large number of colonies present, even if dead as a result of predation by Acanthaster, were torn off by wave action and broken up by boulders. This time, it was the three-dimensional structure of the reef which was affected. This determines the habitat of much of the fauna associated with the coral, including many species of fish. …

Polynesia's coral reefs wiped out by cyclone Oli

Reporting by Denis Pinchuk; Writing in Moscow by Lidia Kelly
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia
Sat Mar 27, 2010 10:22am EDT

Around 200 people gathered in St. Petersburg, thousands of kilometers away from the lake, demanding to revoke the government's January decision to restart Baikal Paper Mill.

Another 500 rallied closer to Baikal, which holds a fifth of the world's total surface fresh water, in the city of Ulan-Ude in the Buryat Republic, according to the organizers.

The loss-making Soviet-era factory was shut in October 2008 after the government ordered it to install a system for drainage away from the lake.

Environmentalists and politicians have staged several protests in recent months, saying the waste from the plant contains harmful substances that destroy the lake's rich wildlife of 1,500 species of animals and plants.

"Putin - hands off Baikal" read a banner displayed at the St. Petersburg rally.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin signaled in August his willingness to lift the restrictions that prevented the plant from dumping waste into the lake after diving to the bed of the lake and consulting with scientists.

"I worked myself in a paper producing industry," Grigory Borisov, a 45-year-old engineer from St. Petersburg told Reuters. "I know that Baikal is getting polluted and no purifying facility will save the lake." …

Protesters rally against Lake Baikal's mill operations

CHARLOTTETOWN, Prince Edward Island, Canada, March 26, 2010 (ENS) - Thousands of harp seal pups are presumed dead in Canada's Gulf of St. Lawrence and starving pups are being found abandoned on the beaches of Prince Edward Island, victims of the worst ice conditions ever recorded in the region.

Environment Canada said March 16 that ice conditions in the Gulf were the lowest in the 41 years it has kept records.

Off Newfoundland, Canada's other seal hunting ground, ice has formed only off the Northern Peninsula when, by now, it has usually extended along the island's northeast coast.

Observers from the International Fund for Animal Welfare report that the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the annual birthing ground of hundreds of thousands of harp seals, is "essentially devoid of both ice and seals."

"The conditions this year are disastrous for seal pups. I've surveyed this region for nine years and have never seen anything like this," said Sheryl Fink, a senior researcher with IFAW.

"There is wide open water instead of the usual ice floes, and rather than the hundreds of thousands of seal pups that we normally encounter, only a handful of baby harp and hooded seals, animals that are normally found on ice, remain on the beaches," she said.

Other observers report that the lack of ice has left seal mothers with few places to bear their young or to feed their pups. Many people have seen the newly born pups stranded on beaches instead of being born out on the ice-covered Gulf where they have entered the world for hundreds of years.

Yet the federal government increased the quota for this year's seal hunt just a few days after federal Fisheries Minister Gail Shea told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation March 10 that poor ice conditions could cause the cancellation of this year's Gulf of St. Lawrence seal hunt. It usually begins at the end of March. …

But extremely high pup mortality is happening again this year. In 2007, 99 percent of harp seal pups born in the Southern Gulf of St Lawrence are thought to have died due to lack of ice. …

Worst Ice Year Kills Canadian Seals Before Hunters Can

The Carbon Quilt is a universal tool to make greenhouse gases visible.

London's daily carbon dioxide emissions. 139 thousand tonnes of carbon dioxide would fill a sphere 521 metres across.

To most Londoners, '139 thousand tonnes of carbon dioxide' is not a very meaningful quantity. Illustrating it in the context of London landmarks allows viewers to make it meaningful for themselves. The illustration is compelling not just because it is visual, but because we can relate to it on a physical level. Londoners - the primary audience - know what it is like to walk across Tower Bridge, or stand near to the Post Office Tower, and so can 'feel' how big 139 thousand tonnes really is.

The Carbon Quilt via Dot Earth

By now, most of us are aware that there is a large patch of floating plastic in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. What you may not know is that it’s not made up of plastic bags and empty bottles. It’s made up of billions of tiny pieces of plastic, and it’s basically invisible unless you’re floating in it. While this might seem better, it’s actually much worse for the environment—and for you. Our latest Transparency is a look at the Pacific Gyre and the plastic floating in it.

Transparency: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch via Ea O Ka Aina

ScienceDaily (Mar. 25, 2010) — Twenty years of field studies reveal that as the Earth has gotten warmer, plants and microbes in the soil have given off more carbon dioxide. So-called soil respiration has increased about one-tenth of 1 percent per year since 1989, according to an analysis of past studies in the journal Nature.

The scientists also calculated the total amount of carbon dioxide flowing from soils, which is about 10-15 percent higher than previous measurements. That number -- about 98 petagrams of carbon a year (or 98 billion metric tons) -- will help scientists build a better overall model of how carbon in its many forms cycles throughout the Earth. Understanding soil respiration is central to understanding how the global carbon cycle affects climate.

"There's a big pulse of carbon dioxide coming off of the surface of the soil everywhere in the world," said ecologist Ben Bond-Lamberty of the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. "We weren't sure if we'd be able to measure it going into this analysis, but we did find a response to temperature."

The increase in carbon dioxide given off by soils -- about 0.1 petagram (100 million metric tons) per year since 1989 -- won't contribute to the greenhouse effect unless it comes from carbon that had been locked away out of the system for a long time, such as in Arctic tundra. This analysis could not distinguish whether the carbon was coming from old stores or from vegetation growing faster due to a warmer climate. But other lines of evidence suggest warming is unlocking old carbon, said Bond-Lamberty, so it will be important to determine the sources of extra carbon. …

Even Soil Feels the Heat: Soils Release More Carbon Dioxide as Globe Warms

ScienceDaily (Mar. 26, 2010) — The economic growth across much of Asia comes with a troubling side effect: pollutants from the region are being wafted up to the stratosphere during monsoon season. The new finding, in a study led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, provides additional evidence of the global nature of air pollution and its effects far above Earth's surface.

The international study is being published March 26 in Science Express. It was funded by the National Science Foundation, NCAR's sponsor, together with NASA and the Canadian Space Agency.

Using satellite observations and computer models, the research team determined that vigorous summertime circulation patterns associated with the Asian monsoon rapidly transport air upward from the Earth's surface. Those vertical movements provide a pathway for black carbon, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and other pollutants to ascend into the stratosphere, about 20-25 miles above the Earth's surface.

"The monsoon is one of the most powerful atmospheric circulation systems on the planet, and it happens to form right over a heavily polluted region," says NCAR scientist William Randel, the lead author. "As a result, the monsoon provides a pathway for transporting pollutants up to the stratosphere."

Once in the stratosphere, the pollutants circulate around the globe for several years. Some eventually descend back into the lower atmosphere, while others break apart.

The study suggests that the impact of Asian pollutants on the stratosphere may increase in coming decades because of the growing industrial activity in China and other rapidly developing nations. In addition, climate change could alter the Asian monsoon, although it remains uncertain whether the result would be to strengthen or weaken vertical movements of air that transport pollutants into the stratosphere. …

Pollution from Asia Circles Globe at Stratospheric Heights

Reported by Trung Duong – Tien Trinh 

2000 custard apple trees.

Around four years old.

To a tree, they withered and died.

That was a month ago.

Now, he can do nothing but watch a hectare of his mango trees fade in the relentless heat.

“Drought like this... there’s no way I can save the trees,” says Tien of An Cu Commune, Tinh Bien District in the Mekong Delta province of An Giang, whose family’s livelihood depends on the fruit trees.

The farmer has faced drought in the mountainous region earlier, but he has “surrendered to the rare harsh heat of this year.”

Actually, Tien is not worried about water for the trees. Not anymore. “I’d have to leave them anyway. But if it keeps being so hot, even people would have little water.”

Tien had spent VND4 million (US$208) trying to drill a borewell to save his trees, but the workers left after several days of looking for water and finding nothing underground.

Wells and ponds around the nearby Dai (Long) Mountain have exposed their bottoms and the rivers are barely flowing.

The Ba Den Well in the commune is the main source of water for people in Tinh Bien District, especially on hot days like these. But residents have noticed that the well has much less water than in previous years.

“Without that well, it will be really hard for people here,” says Do Van Phat, an old man living at the foot of Phu Cuong Mountain. …

More than 1,000 families in Bien Bach Commune of the delta’s Ca Mau Province are also facing a severe water shortage.

Some ponds that still have water in the area have been salinized, said commune head Tran Van Tuan. …

In the central region, people in the mountainous Dakrong District of Quang Tri Province are saying the heat has come earlier and is much more harsh than usual.

And the forest fire in Sa Thay District, Kon Tum was still blazing as of March 17 after destroying hundreds of hectares including primary forest.

‘Not a drop to drink’

By the CNN Wire Staff
March 25, 2010 4:13 a.m. EDT

(CNN) -- Gorillas may go extinct in much of central Africa by the mid-2020s -- victims of a meat trade, of logging and mining, and even the Ebola virus, a new report says.

Unless action is taken to guard the gorillas' habitat and counter poaching, the dire prediction will come to pass, said the joint report from the United Nations and Interpol released Wednesday.

Until now, the Congo Basin in Central Africa had been a rainforest refuge for gorillas and other apes.

But the threats to the gorillas' survival are so acute that a similar study that predicted only 10 percent of the gorilla population will remain by 2030 is now considered too optimistic.

That study -- conducted in 2002 -- did not take into account the rise in the demand for timber and metals destined for Asia, the Middle East and Europe.

The situation is especially critical in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

There, militias have seized large chunks of gorilla land and logged and mined it. They have done so because the illegal trade in timber and in metals such as gold and coltan -- used in cell phones -- generates between $14 million and $50 million a year for them, the report says.

The money helps fund the militias' battle against the Congolese army.

As the militia fight the army, the insecurity in the region has driven thousands into refugee camps. Professional poachers have taken to providing "bush meat" -- wild animal meat -- to the refugees and to the workers in the mining and logging camps. And increasingly, that meat comes from apes, the report says..

Adding to the gorillas' woes are outbreaks of the Ebola virus that have killed thousands of great apes. By some estimates, 90 percent of the infected animals will die. …

Report: Central African gorillas may go extinct

By BRIAN SKOLOFF (AP)

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Coral reefs are dying, and scientists and governments around the world are contemplating what will happen if they disappear altogether.

The idea positively scares them.

Coral reefs are part of the foundation of the ocean food chain. Nearly half the fish the world eats make their homes around them. Hundreds of millions of people worldwide — by some estimates, 1 billion across Asia alone — depend on them for their food and their livelihoods.

If the reefs vanished, experts say, hunger, poverty and political instability could ensue.

"Whole nations will be threatened in terms of their existence," said Carl Gustaf Lundin of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

Numerous studies predict coral reefs are headed for extinction worldwide, largely because of global warming, pollution and coastal development, but also because of damage from bottom-dragging fishing boats and the international trade in jewelry and souvenirs made of coral.

At least 19 percent of the world's coral reefs are already gone, including some 50 percent of those in the Caribbean. An additional 15 percent could be dead within 20 years, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Old Dominion University professor Kent Carpenter, director of a worldwide census of marine species, warned that if global warming continues unchecked, all corals could be extinct within 100 years.

"You could argue that a complete collapse of the marine ecosystem would be one of the consequences of losing corals," Carpenter said. "You're going to have a tremendous cascade effect for all life in the oceans." …

Death of coral reefs could devastate nations