By Adrienne Lafrance 30 May 2017 (The Atlantic) – The water is everywhere. For the second time in a month, Hawaii’s coastlines have been swamped by epic tides. The phenomenon, known as a king tide, is actually a convergence of a few different factors: high lunar tides, rising sea levels associated with last year’s strong […]
2 June 2017 (United Nations) – With about 70,000 cholera cases reported with nearly 600 fatalities in Yemen, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) today warned that an already fire situation for children is turning into a disaster.“Cholera doesn’t need a permit to cross a checkpoint or a border, nor does it differentiate between areas […]
1 June 2017 (United Nations) – A new agreement aimed at stopping rogue fishing practices represents the capstone of years of diplomatic effort to combat the scourge of illegal fishing, according to the United Nations food agency.The Agreement on Port State Measures (PSMA) to Prevent, Deter and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) Fishing, gives […]
By Michael D. Shear 1 June 2017 WASHINGTON (The New York Times) – President Trump announced Thursday that he will withdraw the United States from participation in the Paris climate accord, weakening global efforts to combat climate change and siding with conservatives who argued that the landmark 2015 agreement was harming the economy. […]Mr. Trump’s […]
By Jonathan Easley and Jordan Fabian 31 May 2017 (The Hill) – A White House that has railed against leaks was fractured Wednesday by a new one: President Trump’s decision to pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement. An initial story in Axios, attributed to two sources close to the decision, was […]
By Jonathan Watts 1 May 2017 RIO DE JANEIRO (The Guardian) – Brazilian farmers in Maranhão state have attacked an indigenous settlement, severing the hands and feet of some of their victims in what appears to be a brutal escalation of a territorial conflict. Thirteen members of the Gamela community were hospitalised after the assault […]
By Arthur Neslen 29 May 2017 BRUSSELS (Climate Home) – East European EU states are mounting a behind-the-scenes revolt against the Paris Agreement, blocking key measures needed to deliver the pledge that they signed up to 18 months ago.1 Under the climate accord, Europe promised to shave 40% off its emissions by 2030, mostly by […]
By Carol Rasmussen 25 May 2017(JPL) – A new NASA study finds that during Greenland’s hottest summers on record, 2010 and 2012, the ice in Rink Glacier on the island’s west coast didn’t just melt faster than usual, it slid through the glacier’s interior in a gigantic wave, like a warmed freezer pop sliding out […]
By Kat Kerlin 25 May 2017 (UC Davis) – Experiments with tiny, shelled organisms in the ocean suggest big changes to the global carbon cycle are underway, according to a study from the University of California, Davis.For the study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, scientists raised foraminifera — single-celled organisms about the size of […]
By Jonathan Watts 28 May 2017 Vila Bela da Santíssima Trindade (The Guardian) – To understand why the Brazilian government is deliberately losing the battle against deforestation, you need only retrace the bootmarks of the Edwardian explorer Percy Fawcett along the Amazonian border with Bolivia. During a failed attempt to cross a spectacular tabletop […]
