US states to escape debt burdens through bankruptcy

By MARY WILLIAMS WALSHPublished: January 20, 2011 Policy makers are working behind the scenes to come up with a way to let states declare bankruptcy and get out from under crushing debts, including the pensions they have promised to retired public workers. Unlike cities, the states are barred from seeking protection in federal bankruptcy court. […]

Paul Kedrosky: Don’t count on technology to save us

Adam Taggart, www.Chrismartenson.com Jan. 21, 2011, 10:11 AM This week’s Straight Talk contributor is Paul Kedrosky. Paul is an investor, writer, entrepreneur and editor of the widely-followed econoblog Infectious Greed. He is a prolific engine of commentary on the economy, the markets, and society – often looking through the lens of how technology serves (and […]

New melt record for Greenland ice sheet

Contact: Dr. Marco Tedesco, Cryosphere Processes Laboratory, The City College of New York, mtedesco(at)sci(dot)ccny(dot)cuny(dot)eduMartin Sommerkorn, WWF Global Arctic Programme, msommerkorn(at)wwf(dot)noJanuary 20, 2011 New York (Vocus/PRWEB) – New research shows that 2010 set new records for the melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet, expected to be a major contributor to projected sea level rises in coming […]

Image of the Day: Queensland Flood Plume Hits Great Barrier Reef

By James Mitchell Crow 18 January 2011 The floods that have devastated swathes of southern Queensland are beginning to perturb one of the world’s largest World Heritage Sites, the Great Barrier Reef, scientists in Australia say. Southern parts of the reef, which extends more than 2,000 kilometres along the Queensland coast in northeastern Australia, are […]

UK wild bird numbers continue to fall – Populations of farmland birds at record low

By James Meikle, www.guardian.co.uk Thursday 20 January 2011 14.15 GMT Populations of wild birds in the UK are falling dramatically with even slight recent recoveries apparently stalled, government figures showed today. Only seabird populations remain comfortably above 1970 levels, while farmland bird numbers continue to plunge from a brief mid-1970s peak to half those of […]

ARkStorm: California’s other ‘Big One’

Contact Information: John Bwarie U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological SurveyOffice of Communication119 National CenterReston, VA 20192 Released: 1/14/2011 3:00:00 PM Listen to a podcast interview with Lucy Jones about the ARkStorm Scenario. SACRAMENTO, Calif. — For emergency planning purposes, scientists unveiled a hypothetical California scenario that describes a storm that could produce up […]

‘Unprecedented flows’ as floodwaters approach Australia’s Murray River

By Selma Milovanovic and Richard WillinghamJanuary 21, 2011 COMMUNITIES between Kerang and Swan Hill will be on high alert in the coming days as floodwaters flow north and reach the Murray River. As the levee surrounding Kerang held on and the Loddon River began to recede yesterday, the State Emergency Service said the town would […]

Engineer: California Delta problems ‘the worst damn mess I’ve ever seen’

By Mike Taugher, Contra Costa TimesPosted: 01/19/2011 04:05:56 PM PST Bob Bea has investigated such high-profile disasters as the Exxon Valdez spill, the Deepwater Horizon blast, Hurricane Katrina and the space shuttle Columbia, which exploded in 2003. But the UC engineer and associate director of the Center for Catastrophic Risk Management (CCRM) says the problems […]

Battle for boom became political after Gulf oil spill, officials say

By Jonathan TilovePublished: Wednesday, January 19, 2011, 12:34 PM WASHINGTON — Marcia McNutt, director of the U.S. Geological Survey, and retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, agreed Wednesday that the politics of boom overrode the logic of response during the effort to contain and clean up the BP oil spill. Allen, who was the National […]

UK bees facing a poisoned spring

New kind of pesticide, widely used in UK, may be helping to kill off the world’s honeybees By Michael McCarthy, Environment EditorThursday, 20 January 2011 A new generation of pesticides is making honeybees far more susceptible to disease, even at tiny doses, and may be a clue to the mysterious colony collapse disorder that has […]

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