Virus wipes out millions of oysters overnight in Australia – ‘Very strong possibility’ record heat wave to blame

By Leesha McKenny, Urban Affairs Reporter25 January 2013 (Sydney Morning Herald) – When the news came through, the fourth-generation oyster farmer Rob Moxham said it made him feel sick to his stomach. Tests this week confirmed that the Pacific oyster mortality syndrome had reached the Hawkesbury’s tributary, Mullet Creek, the local industry’s nursery for juvenile […]

Sickening, lung-busting fog settles over Salt Lake City – ‘We’re in a public-health emergency for much of the winter’

By PAUL FOY24 January 2013 SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – Michelle Francis keeps one eye on Utah’s air quality index and the other on her 9-year-old daughter’s chronic asthma these days. The air pollution is so awful in her Salt Lake City suburb that Francis keeps her daughter indoors on many days to prevent her […]

Climate change melting glaciers in the Andes – ‘They will probably completely disappear within the coming decades’

By Jeremy Hance22 January 2013 (mongabay.com) – Glaciers are melting faster than ever in the tropical Andes, warns a new study published in The Cryosphere, which puts the blame for vanishing glaciers squarely on climate change. The study — the most comprehensive to date — found that since the 1970s glacier melt in the region […]

Graph of the Day: Land surface temperature anomalies for Australia, 1 January – 8 January 2013

By Michael Carlowicz23 January 2013 (NASA Earth Observatory) – January 2013 brought record-setting heat to Australia; not just for days, but for weeks. Temperatures regularly eclipsed 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit) in multiple locations across the continent. According to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Australia set a new record for the highest temperature averaged […]

Australia bull is blackened survivor from Chadwick Downs’ death valley – ‘Welcome to the killing fields’

By Tim Barlass21 January 2013 (Sydney Morning Herald) – Red Valentino, through the miracle of artificial insemination, has thousands of his progeny in South Africa, North America, Nicaragua, Colombia, Paraguay … and beyond. Described as one of the most genetically influential bulls of his breed, Red Valentino is, in common parlance, a super stud, one […]

Canberra heading for January heat record as storms spark fire fears

By Stephanie Anderson22 January 2013 Canberra is sweltering through what could be its hottest January on record, according to the Bureau of Meteorology. After hitting a record high of 42 degrees last week, the month’s average could be pushed into the record books, meteorologist Rebecca Kamitakahara said. “We are on track to exceed our January […]

President Obama’s inauguration speech gives climate goals center stage – ‘Failure to do so would betray our children and future generations’

By RICHARD W. STEVENSON and JOHN M. BRODER21 January 2013 WASHINGTON (The New York Times) – President Obama made addressing climate change the most prominent policy vow of his second Inaugural Address, setting in motion what Democrats say will be a deliberately paced but aggressive campaign built around the use of his executive powers to […]

Joe Biden to climate activists: ‘Keep the faith’ – ‘There is science in the White House’

By ANDREW RESTUCCIA21 January 2013 Vice President Joe Biden reassured environmentalists Sunday night that the Obama administration would not let climate change fall by the wayside in the president’s second term. “I’ll tell you what my green dream is: that we finally face up to climate change,” Biden said during a surprise appearance at the […]

US climate fears mount, but political action wanes – ‘We still do not see any prospect for major legislation in Congress’

By Jean-Louis Santini20 January 2013 But despite President Barack Obama renewing his early promises to act, experts said political opposition would make it at least as difficult as during Obama’s first, failed push to get new legislation through Congress, and said decisive measures will remain unlikely. “All the public opinion polls show a better understanding […]

Koch-funded study finds 2.5°F warming of land since 1750 is manmade – ‘Solar forcing does not appear to contribute’

By Joe Romm 20 January 2013 The Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study (BEST) has finally published its findings on the cause of recent global warming. This Koch-funded reanalysis of millions of temperature observations from around the world, “A New Estimate of the Average Earth Surface Land Temperature Spanning 1753 to 2011,” concludes: … solar forcing […]

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