Blogging the End of the World™
By John Talberth and Stephen Posner on July 7, 2010 The BP oil spill will degrade critical ecosystem services and their economic benefits for decades to come. BP’s massive oil spill jeopardizes the underpinning of economic wealth in the Gulf of Mexico region – the diverse coastal and marine ecosystems that generate a bounty of […]
By Paula Kahumbu, Executive Director of WildlifeDirect, special to www.mongabay.com July 08, 2010 Tourists, conservationists, individuals, and tour companies have launched an international outcry against the Tanzanian authorities in response to the announcement of the planned construction of the trans-Serengeti Highway highway. There is even a Facebook group and an online petition with 5,038 signatures. […]
Urgent aid is needed to avert a catastrophe in West Africa By Alastair Stewart To the north of Niger, the creeping Sahara; to the south, oil rich and agriculturally lush Nigeria – this nation straddles the Sahel – dry, hot and cruel. It has suffered catastrophic droughts – 1974, 1984 and 2005. And now, another. […]
By Stephen Messenger, Porto Alegre, Brazil on 07. 8.10 In hopes of slowing the rate at which ice is melting in the mountains of northern Italy, officials have begun covering one their most threatened glaciers with insulating fabric, creating what is essentially a giant security blanket to help keep the ice from melting in the […]
ScienceDaily (July 9, 2010) — Exceptionally long heat waves and other hot events could become commonplace in the United States in the next 30 years, according to a new study by Stanford University climate scientists. “Using a large suite of climate model experiments, we see a clear emergence of much more intense, hot conditions […]
By CalculatedRisk 7/08/2010 02:16:00 PM This graph shows the 30 year fixed rate mortgage interest rate from the Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey®. The red line is a quarterly estimate from the BEA of the effective rate of interest on all outstanding mortgages (Owner- and Tenant-occupied residential housing). The effective rate on outstanding […]
The Associated PressAssociated Press Writer Mary Foster contributed to this report from Grand Isle, La.Published: Wednesday, July 07, 2010, 2:29 PM GULF SHORES, Ala. — There’s a dirty secret buried under Gulf of Mexico beaches after cleanup workers scrape away the oil washing ashore. Walk to a seemingly pristine patch of sand, plop down in […]
By Casandra Andrews, Press-RegisterPublished: Wednesday, July 07, 2010, 2:08 PM MOBILE, Ala. — Alabama Department of Public Health officials reported today that at least 58 people have gone to local emergency rooms, clinics and urgent care centers since May 14 complaining of ailments thought to be related to the oil spill. That compares with 28,835 […]
By Jeremy Hance, www.mongabay.comJuly 07, 2010 An interview with Faith Doherty. The European parliament made a historical move today when it voted overwhelmingly to ban illegal timber from its markets. For activists worldwide the ban on illegal timber in the EU is a reason to celebrate, but for one activist, Faith Doherty of the Environmental […]
In Indonesia, forests cover 463,000 square miles, which ranks behind only Brazil and the Democratic Republic of Congo in size. But rampant illegal logging has made those forests among the most endangered on the planet and has depressed timber prices worldwide. In the 1960s, about 82 percent of Indonesia was forested. By 1995, forest cover […]
