By Steve Connor14 December 2011 Dramatic and unprecedented plumes of methane – a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide – have been seen bubbling to the surface of the Arctic Ocean by scientists undertaking an extensive survey of the region. The scale and volume of the methane release has astonished the head […]
By arevamirpal::laprimavera 12 December 2011 There are foreign nuclear experts who have said the explosion in Reactor 3 on March 14 at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant was a nuclear explosion. But this Japanese engineer and whistleblower at JNES (Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization) Setsuo Fujiwara says there were two explosions at Reactor 3: a […]
By Krista Mahr12 December 2011 They’re baaaaaaaccck. Whale hunting season kicked off in Japan last week as three ships set off with a security vessel on their annual pilgrimage to cull hundreds of minke and fin whales in Antarctic waters. And so begins the annual showdown between the whalers and the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, […]
Bangkok, December 11 (DPA) – Thailand’s flood disaster has been made worse by government corruption, business leaders have complained, a news report said Sunday. Thai Chamber of Commerce chairman Pongsak Assakul was quoted by the Bangkok Post as saying the flooding was one of the worst crises ever to hit the kingdom. ‘And state corruption […]
By MARTIN FACKLER6 December 2011 FUTABA, Japan – Futaba is a modern-day ghost town — not a boomtown gone bust, not even entirely a victim of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that leveled other parts of Japan’s northeast coast. Its traditional wooden homes have begun to sag and collapse since they were abandoned in March […]
By Brian Williams, The Courier-Mail12 December 2011 ONE in every six species related to characters in the smash hit kids’ movie Finding Nemo is threatened with extinction. Scientists analysed risks faced by Nemo, the charismatic clownfish, and more than 1500 other species related to characters in the 2003 animation. International Union for Conservation of Nature […]
There are deals and then there are deals. That’s my takeaway from the U.N. climate negotiations in the South African city of Durban, which finally concluded early Sunday local time — more than a day after the talks had been scheduled to end. Exhausted negotiators — seriously, look at these poor guys — managed to […]
Projected annual changes in dryness assessed from change in annual maximum number of consecutive dry days (CDD, days with precipitation <1 mm). Increased dryness is indicated with yellow to red colors; decreased dryness with green to blue. Projected changes are expressed in units of standard deviation of the interannual variability in the three 20-year periods […]
By Captain Locky MacLean10 December 2011 When one thinks of world-class diving, the tiny Republic of the Maldives immediately comes to mind. Keen divers travel from all corners of the globe to this Indian Ocean island nation. They come to marvel at the biodiversity its atolls and islands shelter under their shores. The Maldivian islands, […]
It’s time for the yearly retrospectives on 2011, and we’re kicking them off with 2011’s most-viewed stories on Desdemona. It won’t surprise anyone to see that the triple meltdown at the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant was the most popular event, with 9 of the top 20 stories. Most surprising is the continued popularity of a 2009 […]
