Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Crackdown on protestors of Chilean copper mine leaves eight injured

[Translation by Microsoft Translator. –Des] 6 March 2015 (El Ciudadano) – Yesterday, Wednesday 4 March, in Salamanca, Choapa Valley (IV Region of Coquimbo) police violently cracked down on hundreds of people mobilized, demanding a solution to the environmental crisis, suffering for years product of the functioning of the Los Pelambres. With the arrival of three […]

Iditarod show goes on despite lack of snow – City crews overnight delivered up to 350 dump truck loads of snow and spread it out over city blocks so the show could go on

By MARK THIESSEN8 March 2015 ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) – If there is one day when mushers in the Iditarod sled dog race don’t have to worry about trail conditions, it should be Saturday during the ceremonial start. A lack of snow south of the Alaska Range created treacherous trail conditions, forcing race officials to move […]

Why are California sea lion pups starving? ‘Any fishing on sardines right now is overfishing, as the population is not even replacing itself, much less providing a surplus’

By Ben Enticknap23 February 2015 (Oceana.org) – Recent national news stories have shown emaciated California sea lion pups being rescued and admitted to marine mammal rehabilitation centers. The sight of hundreds of withered sea lions is reminiscent of the all-too-recent California sea lion “unusual mortality event” in 2013 followed by a significant number of stranded […]

In Florida, officials ban term ‘climate change’ – ‘It’s beyond ludicrous to deny using the term climate change. It’s criminal at this point.’

By Tristram Korten 8 March 2015 (Miami Herald) – The state of Florida is the region most susceptible to the effects of global warming in this country, according to scientists. Sea-level rise alone threatens 30 percent of the state’s beaches over the next 85 years. But you would not know that by talking to officials […]

Photo gallery: China disappearing into haze of air pollution – ‘We have reached a point in history where we seriously have to think about how we want to proceed as a species and how we want to treat the world we inhabit’

By Nick Kirkpatrick 2 March 2015 (Washington Post) – China is disappearing into a haze of pollution. In the capital, it’s a “life-or death situation,” as Beijing’s mayor bluntly put it in January. In February, he went so far as to declare his city unlivable. “Everyone must decide for himself if he wants to care […]

The Misanthropocene: How humanity learned to hate itself, then died

(The Misanthropocene) – […] We know more and more in deeper and deeper ways just how screwed we are ecologically. And yet we continue on, dig our heels in and argue that at least some human comfort is reasonable while we watch the world burn. Right? But we’re killing ourselves off in other ways, too. […]

Pollinators in decline around the world – ‘Pollinating species will become extinct and we will lose key, irreplaceable species in our ecosystems’

By Matt Walker4 March 2015 (BBC News) – Around the world, animals that pollinate flowering plants are in decline. An increasing number of pollinating mammal and bird species are moving towards extinction, according to the first study of its kind. Other, so far unpublished studies, also suggest that pollinating insect species are also heading towards […]

California farmers resign themselves to drought – ‘We’re having to go deeper and deeper. They say we’re tapping water millions of years old.’

By Rory Carroll 7 March 2015 Fresno, California (the Guardian) – Kim Hammond does not want responsibility for her neighbours’ livelihoods, or for the crops which stretch in all directions as far as the eye can see, or for the earth itself in this corner of California. But these days, her little bungalow office in […]

Indigenous Peruvians win Amazon pollution payout from U.S. oil giant – ‘My son and daughter died vomiting blood’

By Dan Collyns5 March 2015 Lima (The Guardian) – Members of the indigenous Achuar tribe from the Peruvian Amazon have won an undisclosed sum from Occidental Petroleum in an out-of-court settlement after a long-running legal battle in the US courts. They sued the company in 2007, alleging it knowingly caused pollution which caused premature deaths, […]

Video: Decline of Arctic sea ice, 1987-2014

20 January 2015 (NOAA) – Each winter, sea ice expands to fill nearly the entire Arctic Ocean basin, reaching its maximum extent in March. Each summer, the ice pack shrinks, reaching its smallest extent in September. The ice that survives at least one summer melt season tends to be thicker and more likely to survive […]

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