By Richard Branson and James CameronAugust 18, 2013 We share a deep and abiding passion for and fascination with the ocean that has led us since childhood to wander the world under the waves. We also share an increasing concern that the health of the ocean is rapidly deteriorating under the strain of human pressure […]
13 August 2013 (SSCS) – Faroe Islands update: After not killing any cetaceans during the first 6 months of this year, the last 23 days have seen the Faroese massacre 1106 small cetaceans: 125 pilot whales killed on 21st July at Viðvík 267 pilot whales killed on 30th July at Fuglafjørður 107 pilot whales killed […]
By Damian Carrington 6 August 2013 (The Guardian) – A starved polar bear found found dead in Svalbard as “little more than skin and bones” perished due to a lack of sea ice on which to hunt seals, according to a renowned polar bear expert. Climate change has reduced sea ice in the Arctic to […]
23 July 2013 (EEA) – Grassland butterflies have declined dramatically between 1990 and 2011. This has been caused by intensifying agriculture and a failure to properly manage grassland ecosystems, according to a report from the European Environment Agency (EEA). The fall in grassland butterfly numbers is particularly worrying, according to the report, because these butterflies […]
By Geert De Clercq30 July 2013 PARIS (Reuters) – French utility EDF, the world’s biggest operator of nuclear plants, is pulling out of nuclear energy in the United States, bowing to the realities of a market that has been transformed by cheap shale gas. Several nuclear reactors in the U.S. have been closed or are […]
By Rebecca Morelle, Science reporter, BBC World Service2 August 2013 (BBC) – Shifts in climate are strongly linked to increases in violence around the world, a study suggests. US scientists found that even small changes in temperature or rainfall correlated with a rise in assaults, rapes and murders, as well as group conflicts and war. […]
By Lindsay Abrams30 July 2013 (Salon) – When a nuclear power plant closes, a coal plant opens. At least, that’s the way things are shaping up in Germany, where the move away from nuclear energy appears to have backfired. For the second consecutive year, according to Bloomberg, the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions are set to […]
By Bary Alyssa Johnson21 July 2013 (Latinos Post) – The Iberian lynx has seen severe population decline over the past hundred or so years and now the species faces extinction as a very real future possibility. This species of lynx, which now numbers only 250 in the wild, has been decimated in southern Europe over […]
By Ritchie King and Josh Kadis 12 July 2013 (Quartz) – The Tour de France has seen better days. A spate of recent doping scandals in the cycling world has severely undercut the sport’s credibility, starting with the discovery of a French team’s rolling pharmacy in 1998′s Tour and culminating in Lance Armstrong’s televised admission […]
By Dr. Jeff Masters 13 July 2013 (wunderground.com) – A massive fire burning in northern Quebec is Canada’s second largest fire since fire records began in 1959, according to the Canadian Forest Service. The fire was more than twice the size of Rhode Island on Tuesday–1,621,000 acres. Called the Eastmain fire, the near-record blaze was […]