Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Graph of the Day: Vegetation and Soil Carbon Removal from Atmosphere, 1850-2100

The free ecosystem service that has been buying us time may not last. Richard Betts, Mike Sanderson, Debbie Hemming, Mark New, Jason Lowe, Chris Jones, 4°C global warming: regional patterns and timing, 4 Degrees and Beyond Conference,  [pdf], p. 9 Technorati Tags: carbon sequestration,carbon dioxide,global warming,climate change

East Africa drought leaves millions hungry

  By Frank Nyakairu NAIROBI (Reuters) – Drought for a fifth year running is driving more than 23 million east Africans in seven countries toward severe hunger and destitution, international aid agency Oxfam said on Tuesday. Launching a 9.5 million pound appeal, it said the situation was being worsened by high food prices and conflict. […]

Skulls found on Mafia ship laden with radioactive waste

Cameras sent down to investigate vessel appear to show human remains By Michael Day in Milan Pressure is growing on the Italian government to act over revelations that 30 or more ships with radioactive cargoes, deliberately sunk by the Mafia, may be polluting the Mediterranean. The Calabrian region in the south of the country last […]

Graph of the Day: Northern Hemisphere Ice Extent and Snow Cover Extent, 1960s to Present

Reductions in terrestrial snow cover (blue) and sea ice (red) extent during June to August over the Northern Hemisphere since the late 1960s and 1970s, respectively. Data are from the Global Snow Lab, Rutgers University, New Jersey, and the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado, Boulder. Eric Post, et al., Ecological […]

Toxic algae blooms increasing in Midwest U.S.

By ROBERT IMRIE (AP) WAUSAU, Wis. — Waterways across the upper Midwest are increasingly plagued with ugly, smelly and potentially deadly blue-green algae, bloomed by drought and fertilizer runoffs from farm fields, that’s killed dozens of dogs and sickened many people. Aquatic biologists say it’s a problem that falls somewhere between a human health concern […]

Global increase in atmospheric methane likely caused by unusual Arctic warmth, tropical wetness

ScienceDaily (Sep. 28, 2009) — Unusually high temperatures in the Arctic and heavy rains in the tropics likely drove a global increase in atmospheric methane in 2007 and 2008 after a decade of near-zero growth, according to a new study. Methane is the second most abundant greenhouse gas after carbon dioxide, albeit a distant second. […]

Graph of the Day: Northward Expansion of Winter Moth in Fennoscandia, 1965-2008

Northward expansion of insect herbivores such as the winter moth in northernmost Fennoscandia (intact mountain birch forest is shown in green, severely defoliated forest during the most recent outbreak in 2005 to 2008 is in dark brown, and tundra beyond the tree line is in white; reports of local winter moth outbreaks before the last […]

Hornet army plotting invasion of UK

An army of deadly Chinese hornets is heading north through France towards Britain after attempts to trap and poison them failed.  By Ian JohnstonPublished: 10:59AM BST 26 Sep 2009 The hornets, Vespa velutina, are thought to have arrived in Bordeaux on a container ship from China in 2004 and have been rapidly expanding their population […]

Graph of the Day: Rate of Change of Surface Elevation for Antarctica and Greenland, 2003-2007

Change measurements are median filtered (10-km radius), spatially averaged (5-km radius) and gridded to 3 km, from intervals (Dt) of at least 365 d, over the period 2003–2007 (mean Dt is 728 d for Antarctica and 746 d for Greenland). East Antarctic data cropped to 2,500-m altitude. White dashed line (at 81.5° S) shows southern […]

India heading for worst drought since 1972: weather data

New Delhi (AFP) Sept 23, 2009 – India’s monsoon was about 20 percent below strength just over a week before the official end of the rainy reason, putting the country on course for its worst drought since 1972, weather data showed Wednesday. “Until September 21, for the country as a whole, the rain deficiency was […]

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