Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Canada permafrost recedes 130 km in 50 years

  ScienceDaily (Feb. 17, 2010) — The southern limit of permanently frozen ground, or permafrost, is now 130 kilometers further north than it was 50 years ago in the James Bay region, according to two researchers from the Department of Biology at Université Laval. In a recent issue of the scientific journal Permafrost and Periglacial […]

Yemen capital ‘will be a ghost city in 20 years’ due to groundwater depletion

By Ulf Laessing SANAA, Feb 17 (Reuters) – Yemeni water trader Mohammed al-Tawwa runs his diesel pumps day and night, but gets less and less from his well in Sanaa, which experts say could become the world’s first capital city to run dry. “My well is now 400 metres (1,300 feet) deep and I don’t […]

‘Red alert’ issued for toxic algae bloom in Murray River

February 17, 2010 PEOPLE are being warned to avoid contact with the Murray River for the second time in less than a year, as a toxic algal bloom takes hold in the river’s upper reaches. A ”red alert” has been issued for more than 150 kilometres between Hume Dam and Cobram, while the stretch from […]

Planned Australia coal mine threatens wetland conservation area

By BEN CUBBYFebruary 18, 2010 EIGHT swamps inside a conservation area which provide habitat for endangered native animals are likely to be lost if BHP Billiton is allowed to go ahead with plans to develop giant coalmines on Sydney’s south-western outskirts. The company has conceded that the swamps – natural filters that keep the Georges […]

Tour of the toxic chemical soup in the North Pacific Gyre

By Thomas Morton, Online Editor, Vice Magazine February 17, 2010 4:16 p.m. EST Brooklyn, New York (VBS.TV) — Back in the mid-zeroes, I remember reading a lot of stories about a buildup of trash in the Pacific Ocean so massive that it had formed a floating island of waste the size of Texas. Its colorful […]

Tajikistan facing water shortages and climate extremes

Falling supplies due to rising temperatures and retreating glaciers could spark conflict between water-stressed countries in the region, says Oxfam By John Vidal, environment editorwww.guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 17 February 2010 06.00 GMT It has been occupied by the Russians, the Mongols, the Turks, the Arabs and the Uzbeks, the Chinese, as well as Genghis Khan. But […]

Asian-carp threat stirs rethink of century-old feat

Great Lakes States Want to Effectively Undo a Historic Project and Cut Link to Mississippi River to Fend Off Invasive Fish By DOUGLAS BELKIN CHICAGO—More than a century ago, this city reversed the flow of its eponymous river, connecting the Great Lakes with the Gulf of Mexico and defining itself as the can-do capital of […]

Virginia peninsula in 'dire straits' because of global warming

By David Macaulay 247-783810:18 PM EST, February 15, 2010 HAMPTON — Sobering evidence of how storms will have an increasingly devastating effect on the Peninsula as the century progresses is outlined in a new model by the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. “This is an important issue for us to get moving on,” Eric Walberg, […]

Lost ‘ghost' traps keep catching lobsters; Maine lobstermen lose 100,000 to 200,000 traps per year

Associated PressUpdated: 11/27/2009 07:27:52 AM EST, Friday, Nov. 27 PORTLAND (AP) — Beneath the cold ocean waters off the coast of Maine, the nation’s lobster breadbasket, lie hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of old wire lobster “ghost traps.” Lost over the years to storms, boats — even the knives of fishermen who’ve cut them from […]

Cold snap killing Florida's coral reefs

By Staff WritersMiami (AFP) Feb 15, 2010 Miami (AFP) Feb 15, 2010 – The polar snap enveloping much of the United States in record cold has been killing off coral reefs in the normally balmy warm waters off the Florida Keys, experts said Monday. The unusually chilly weather so far this year has seen sea […]

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