Blogging the End of the World™
[Desdemona was fascinated by this story in 2010; apparently, the prospects of the South China Mall haven’t improved since then.] By Johan Nylander3 March 2013 Dongguan, China (CNN) – They built it, but the shoppers didn’t come. New South China Mall in Guangdong Province opened in 2005. With 5 million square feet of shopping area, […]
By John Vidal 4 March 2013 (guardian.co.uk) – Ships should be able to sail directly over the north pole by the middle of this century, considerably reducing the costs of trade between Europe and China but posing new economic, strategic and environmental challenges for governments, according to scientists. The dramatic reduction in the thickness and […]
By Roger Harrabin, Environment analyst3 March 2013 (BBC) – Britain must become more resilient to both drought and flooding, Environment Agency chairman Chris Smith has said. New figures from the agency show that one in every five days saw flooding in 2012, but one in four days saw drought. Rivers such as the Tyne, Ouse, […]
By MALCOLM FOSTER, Associated Press28 February 2013 TOKYO (AP) – It is the king of sushi, one of the most expensive fish in the world – and dwindling so rapidly that some fear it could vanish from restaurant menus within a generation. Yet there is little alarm in Japan, the country that consumes about 80 […]
By Paul Rosenberg25 February 2013 Could feelings of disgust be the key to saving the planet from global warming? Strange as it might seem, the answer may be yes. Concern over environmental harm is disproportionately a liberal phenomena, but concern over violating the purity and sanctity of nature cuts across ideological lines. What’s more, it’s […]
By Rob Jordan 25 February 2013 (Stanford Report) – It’s no secret that China is faced with some of the world’s worst pollution. Until now, however, information on the magnitude, scope and impacts of a major contributor to that pollution – human-caused nitrogen emissions – was lacking. A new study co-authored by Stanford Woods Institute […]
Contact: Ruth Dasso Marlaire, ruth.marlaire@nasa.gov, Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California,650-604-470925 February 2013 NASA scientists report that warmer temperatures and changes in precipitation locally and regionally have altered the growth of large forest areas in the eastern United States over the past 10 years. Using NASA’s Terra satellite, scientists examined the relationship between natural plant […]
By Dan Vergano3 March 2013 (USA TODAY) – Deforestation by early farmers likely kicked off an era of man-made climate change long before our present era, suggests a climate scientist taking a hard look at agriculture’s early effects. Chopping down trees with flint axes, planting peas and shearing sheep — those all sound like the […]
By Lisa Palmer1 March 2013 (The New York Times) – Dieter Helm has long been frustrated that, despite more than two decades of international negotiations, the world has failed to tackle climate change. So he got angry, he said, and decided to write a book about it: The Carbon Crunch: How We’re Getting Climate Change […]
By Tanya Lewis, LiveScience1 March 2013 (NBC News) – Coastal regions around the United States respond differently to ocean acidification, a large-scale study finds. In the new study, scientists from 11 U.S. institutions measured levels of carbon dioxide and other forms of carbon in waters off the East Coast and the Gulf of Mexico. If […]
