Louisiana planning for 1-meter sea level rise by 2100

By CAIN BURDEAU, The Associated Press7 February 2012 NEW ORLEANS – A scientific report [Recommendations for Anticipating Sea-Level Rise Impacts on Louisiana Coastal Resources during Project Planning and Design, pdf] issued by Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration predicts that the Louisiana coast could see about 3 feet of sea level rise along the already low and […]

Meteorologist Jeff Masters: ‘The climate has shifted to a new state capable of delivering rare and unprecedented weather events’

By Christine Shearer6 February 2012 If you are interested in weather, chances are you have visited Weather Underground and read the posts of its director of meteorology, Dr. Jeff Masters. The consistently reliable Masters has been a rare voice in helping make sense of, rather than cloud (zing!), the increasingly strange weather events hitting the […]

Crops doomed as Australia township wins reprieve from floodwaters

By Andrew Fraser, The Australian9 February 2012 FLOODED St George in southern Queensland is facing a delayed hit from the surging Balonne River while more than a fifth of the surrounding cotton crop faces ruin. The Balonne yesterday peaked at 13.95m, and is expected to stay near that record mark for days, frustrating the hopes […]

Loss of sea-ice bringing Arctic cold to Europe

By Steve Connor4 February 2012 The bitterly cold weather sweeping Britain and the rest of Europe has been linked by scientists with the ice-free seas of the Arctic, where global warming is exerting its greatest influence. A dramatic loss of sea ice covering the Barents and Kara Seas above northern Russia could explain why a […]

Australia urges residents to flee record floods

7 February 2012 (CNN) – Australian authorities on Monday pleaded with hundreds of people who had chosen to remain in a town in the path of rising flood waters to vacate their homes. The level of the Balonne River in the town of St. George, in the eastern state of Queensland, swelled to 13.63 meters […]

Burt Rutan: Rocketeer, climate science denier

[Desdemona admits to being very disappointed in Burt Rutan. Des was raised on Golden Age science fiction (“R is for Rocket”), and has nursed the romantic illusion that space exploration might somehow prevent humans from destroying Earth – maybe by moving industry off-world and mining asteroids, or something. But here we have an accomplished aerospace […]

Bill Gates backs climate scientists lobbying for large-scale geoengineering

[Longtime readers know how Desdemona feels about most of these geo-engineering schemes: So the leaders of men conceived of their most desperate strategy yet.] By John Vidal, environment editor, The Guardian5 February 2012 A small group of leading climate scientists, financially supported by billionaires including Bill Gates, are lobbying governments and international bodies to back […]

Texas drought forces a town to sip from a truck – 13 public water systems projected to run out of water in 180 days or less

By MANNY FERNANDEZ3 February 2012 SPICEWOOD BEACH, Texas – The water that once nourished this central Texas community never traveled far: it came from a fenced-in well at the edge of Lake Travis, down a winding street next to the golf course. These days, the water that flows from kitchen and bathroom faucets takes an […]

Video: Global surface temperatures, 1937-2011

Global temperatures have warmed significantly since 1880, the beginning of what scientists call the “modern record.” At this time, the coverage provided by weather stations allowed for essentially global temperature data. As greenhouse gas emissions from energy production, industry and vehicles have increased, temperatures have climbed, most notably since the late 1970s. In this animation […]

New study provides insight into Southern Ocean food web – ‘Likely to be regional extinctions of some species’

2 Feb 2012 (BAS) – One of the most comprehensive studies of animals in the Southern Ocean reveals a region that is under threat from the effects of environmental change. Reporting in January 2012 in a special volume of the journal Deep Sea Research II, an international team of researchers led by British Antarctic Survey […]

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