Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Climate change eroding Alaska coast at accelerating rate

By Tim BradnerAlaska Journal of Commerce Coastal erosion isn’t the only climate-related problem confronting rural communities. Health officials now are concerned about food and water safety in northern villages as warming temperatures thaw ice cellars and melting permafrost increases the organic content in rivers, creating problems in village water treatment plants. As for erosion, it […]

Inuit villages need cash for freezers in warming Arctic

  Reporting by Henriette Jacobsen; Writing by John Acher COPENHAGEN (Reuters) – Inuit communities need funds to adapt to climate change in the Arctic, including measures to build communal deep freezers to store game because warming is reducing their hunting season, an Inuit leader said on Friday. The Inuit, the indigenous people of Greenland, Canada, […]

Rising seas threaten 20 million in Bangladesh

Reporting by Nizam Ahmed; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani, DHAKAFri Dec 11, 2009 8:49am EST DHAKA (Reuters) – Rising sea levels, triggered by global warming, will displace about 20 million people in low-lying Bangladesh, a study by a state-run think-tank said on Friday. “The sea level will rise at least by three meters (yards) submerging some […]

Climate change played key role in B.C. sockeye stocks collapse, say scientists

By Tamsyn Burgmann (CP) VANCOUVER, B.C. — Food-poor, predator-rich ocean waters caused by climate change likely played a significant role in decimating millions of sockeye salmon in British Columbia’s Fraser River ahead of what was supposed to be a bumper year, says a scientific think tank. A group of more than 20 ocean and ecology […]

Graph of the Day: Consumer Credit, 1969-2009

From Calculated Risk: The Federal Reserve reports: Consumer credit decreased at an annual rate of 3-1/4 percent in the third quarter of 2009. Revolving credit decreased at an annual rate of 7-1/4 percent, and non-revolving credit decreased at an annual rate of 1 percent. In October, consumer credit decreased at an annual rate of 1-3/4 […]

Mass poisoning to keep carp invaders from Great Lakes

By Phil McKenna, 10 December 2009   Sometimes the “few” are made to suffer to protect the many. Tens of thousands of fish were poisoned last week in a drastic attempt to keep invasive Asian carp out of the Great Lakes. Officials poured more than 8000 litres of the fish poison rotenone into a 9-kilometre stretch […]

Ocean acidification rates pose disaster for marine life, major study shows

Report launched from leading marine scientists at Copenhagen summit shows seas absorbing dangerous levels of CO2 By Severin Carrellwww.guardian.co.uk, Thursday 10 December 2009 10.52 GMT The world’s oceans are becoming acidic at a faster rate than at any time in the last 55m years, threatening disaster for marine life and food supplies across the globe, […]

Another fatal blow to Asian vultures

By John Platt As if it weren’t bad enough that 99.9 percent of Asian vultures have been killed off in the past 20 years, now comes news that yet another potential man-made disaster waits in the wings. Millions of Asian vultures, particularly those in India, have died off over the last two decades after being […]

Tigers endangered in half of Indian reserves

By Matthias Williams, NEW DELHI, Wed Dec 9, 2009 6:50am EST NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Tigers are in a “very, very precarious” state and could disappear altogether in nearly half of India’s tiger reserves, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said on Wednesday. India is a key player in efforts to conserve the dwindling global tiger population, […]

Graph of the Day: Ice-out Dates for Eight New England Lakes, 1800s – 2000

Smoothed lines of ice-out dates over time for the eight lakes in New England with the longest periods of record. The top four lines represent lakes in northern and western Maine and the bottom four lines represent lakes in southern Maine. Ice-out dates from 29 lakes in New England with 64 to 163 years of […]

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