Failure to act on threats to global sustainability brings the world closer to disaster By Jeffrey D. SachsSeptember 2010 Scientific American Magazine With this final column I will transition Sustainable Developments from Scientific American to the home page of the Earth Institute (ww.earth.columbia.edu). Although I will continue to contribute occasional essays to the magazine, I […]
By Ray RingFrom the August 20, 2010 issue of High Country News Lander, Wyoming — Ask Tom Bell, the man who founded High Country News 40 years ago, what keeps him going these days, and he rattles off a list of pills for dizziness, blood pressure and cholesterol, plus a diuretic and an antidepressant. “Don’t […]
By Wynne Parry, Senior Writer29 July 2010 07:39 am ET One hundred days ago Thursday, the oil rig Deepwater Horizon began spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico. As profoundly as the leak of millions of barrels of oil is injuring the Gulf ecosystem, it is only one of many threats to the Earth’s oceans […]
This occurred to Desdemona in the shower: 1. Environmentalists propose protections.2. Industry dominates the debate and compromises government.3. Inevitable catastrophe occurs.4. Environmentalists are blamed.5. Industry shifts all costs of remediation to government.6. Repeat Step 1. Technorati Tags: doom,corruption,oil production,oil spill,pollution
By Cheryl JonesJune 16, 2010 12:00AM FRANK Fenner doesn’t engage in the skirmishes of the climate wars. To him, the evidence of global warming is in. Our fate is sealed. “We’re going to become extinct,” the eminent scientist says. “Whatever we do now is too late.” Fenner is an authority on extinction. The emeritus professor […]
By Dmitry OrlovTuesday, June 15, 2010 In all of the descriptions of perilous situations that I have studied, arising during adventures on the high seas or in the high mountains, or during armed conflict, a single mistake rarely proves fatal. More often than not, death comes as a result of a sequence of bad choices […]
By Rick Jervis, USA TODAY1 June 2010 NEW ORLEANS — Anger and frustration surged across the Gulf Coast on Monday as residents learned that the latest attempt to cap a renegade underwater well had failed and that oil may keep gushing into the Gulf of Mexico until at least August, when relief wells are scheduled […]
ScienceDaily (May 5, 2010) — Reasonable worst-case scenarios for global warming could lead to deadly temperatures for humans in coming centuries, according to research findings from Purdue University and the University of New South Wales, Australia. Researchers for the first time have calculated the highest tolerable “wet-bulb” temperature and found that this temperature could be […]
April 12, 2010 by Lisa Zyga (PhysOrg.com) — California-based company Vivos is providing you and about 4,000 other people the chance to survive the end of the world. The company plans to build a network of 20 shelters near most major cities of the US. Each 20,000-square-foot shelter, which can hold up to 200 people, […]
By MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT, ENVIRONMENT REPORTER Published on Thursday, Apr. 01, 2010 4:30PM EDT Japanese scientists testing ocean water and sea sand have found widespread contamination with high levels bisphenol A, a chemical used to make plastic that’s able to mimic the female hormone estrogen in living things. Its presence in sea water comes from the […]
