Photos show dramatic shrinking of Mount Everest glaciers

By Louise Gray, Environment CorrespondentPublished: 12:42PM BST 18 Jul 2010 The two pictures show an “alarming” retreat in ice over more than 80 years. The first was taken in 1921 by British mountaineer George Mallory, who later died trying to conquer Everest. The Asia Society commissioned the same picture to be taken of the main […]

Seep found near BP’s busted oil well, says federal official

By Colleen Long and Harry R. Weber of The Associated PressSunday, July 18, 2010, 4:56 PM NEW ORLEANS — A federal official said Sunday that scientists are concerned about a seep and possible methane seen near BP’s busted oil well in the Gulf of Mexico. Both could be signs there are leaks in the well […]

Graph of the Day: Global Temperature Anomalies, June 2010

The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for June 2010 was the warmest on record at 16.2°C (61.1°F), which is 0.68°C (1.22°F) above the 20th century average of 15.5°C (59.9°F). The previous record for June was set in 2005. June 2010 was the fourth consecutive warmest month on record (March, April, and May […]

Russia swelters in heatwave and worst drought in 130 years — Many crops destroyed

  By Dmitry Solovyov, Gleb Bryanski and Alexander Reshetnikov; Editing by Matthew Jones (Reuters) – Soaring temperatures across large swathes of Russia have destroyed nearly 10 million hectares of crops and prompted a state of emergency to be declared in 17 regions. On Friday the state-run Moscow region weather bureau said it expected the heatwave, […]

Thailand to release 250,000 wasps to fight South American invader

Thailand is to release a quarter of a million wasps to fight a South American insect wreaking havoc on the country’s cassava crops. The tiny parasitic wasps will be unleashed in Thailand’s  northeastern province of Khon Kaen on Sunday in an attempt to control the pest outbreak. The invader, the cassava mealybug, sucks sap from […]

Indian Ocean levels rising, study shows

  Boulder, Colo. (UPI) Jul 15, 2010 – Indian Ocean sea levels are rising unevenly, posing a threat to residents in some densely populated coastal areas and islands, a new study says. The study, led by researchers at the University of Colorado in Boulder and the National Center for Atmospheric Research, attributes the sea-level rise […]

‘Barrier island’ sand berms for blocking oil spill damage wash away

By Brad Johnson15 July 2010 As experts warned, Bobby Jindal’s “obvious” response to the BP oil disaster is failing. Since the beginning of May, Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) has pushed a crash effort to build artificial “barrier islands” from dredged sand to prevent BP’s toxic oil from reaching Louisiana’s fragile coastline. He and other Louisiana […]

BP declares Deepwater Horizon well to be fully closed

“official time of choke fully closed 2:25 this afternoon (well fully closed)” Starting the Testing Program and Open Thread By Katherine Sayre, Press-RegisterPublished: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 2:51 PM MOBILE, Ala. — A BP official said oil stopped flowing from a well in the Gulf of Mexico at 2:25 p.m. as testing began on a […]

Ecosystem damage to show true cost of Gulf spill

  Paris (AFP) July 13, 2010 – The Gulf of Mexico oil disaster is likely to cost far more than cleanup and compensation for lost income once damage to ecosystems is factored in, a top expert said Tuesday. In an interview coinciding with a UN-sponsored report on the link between business and biodiversity, economist Pavan […]

Mapping the Atlantic Garbage Patch: Expedition counts up to 500,000 pieces of plastic per square kilometer

By Marissa Lang, Globe Correspondent July 14, 2010 Researchers from the Sea Education Association have removed tens of thousands of plastic fragments from the Atlantic Ocean over the past six weeks in what many believe is just a small part of a giant collection of debris in the middle of the ocean. In their search […]

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