Storms filled 37 percent of California snow-water deficit

27 January 2017 (JPL) – The “atmospheric river” weather patterns that pummeled California with storms from late December to late January may have recouped 37 percent of the state’s five-year snow-water deficit, according to new University of Colorado Boulder-led research using NASA satellite data. Researchers at the university’s Center for Water Earth Science and Technology […]

Harvests in the U.S. to suffer under global warming

19 January 2017 (Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research) – Some of the most important crops risk substantial damage from rising temperatures. To better assess how climate change caused by human greenhouse gas emissions will likely impact wheat, maize and soybean, an international team of scientists now ran an unprecedentedly comprehensive set of computer simulations […]

Record drought in Bolivia drains lakes, threatens capital, and kills livestock by the thousands – “The situation in our area is critical”

4 January 2017 (The Associated Press) – Last year, the flowering quinoa plants painted Florencio Tola’s farmlands in vibrant sepia and ochre tones. But this season, all that could be seen was the straw colour of dried-out stalks that never germinated amid Bolivia’s worst drought in 30 years. Nearby a collection of scrawny cows, with […]

No more mass deaths from drought in Northeast Brazil

By Mario Osava1 January 2017 OURICURI, Brazil (IPS) – The drought that has plagued Brazil’s semiarid Northeast region since 2012 is already more severe than the 1979-1983 drought, the longest in the 20th century. But prolonged dry spells no longer cause the tragedies of the past. There are no widespread deaths from hunger or thirst […]

National Geographic asked photographers to show the impact of climate change, here’s what they shot

24 November 2016 (Washington Post) – National Geographic asked a global community of photographers to share their stories about climate change. Photos were submitted through Your Shot, National Geographic’s online photo community, and then editors’ selections were chosen to be in an exhibit at the Conference of the Parties 22 Climate Summit in Morocco. [more] […]

EPA concludes fracking can threaten water supplies

[Expect these sorts of studies to stop when Scott Pruitt, longtime enemy of the EPA and Trump’s selection to head the EPA, takes control. –Des] By Patrick G. Lee14 December 2016 (ProPublica) – Starting in 2008, ProPublica published stories that found hydraulic fracking had damaged drinking water supplies across the country. The reporting examined how […]

Bolivian water crisis as glaciers vanish

By Jan Rocha26 November 2016 SÃO PAOLO (Climate News Network) – The government of Bolivia, a landlocked country in the heart of South America, has been forced to declare a state of emergency as it faces its worst drought for at least 25 years. Much of the water supply to La Paz, the highest capital […]

Global wildlife populations could drop two-thirds by 2020 as human demand continues to exceed Earth’s capacity

OAKLAND, California, 26 October 2016 (Global Footprint Network) – The overexploitation of ecological resources by humanity is directly contributing to the 67 percent plunge in wild vertebrate populations scientists forecast for the 50-year period ending in 2020, according to WWF’s Living Planet Report 2016. The top threats to species identified in the report are directly […]

Climate change wars are coming and building walls won’t help, top general warns

By Ian Johnston26 October 2016 (Independent) – Climate change is threatening to force millions of people to become refugees and spark major wars that could “completely destabilise” the world, a leading general has warned. And countries which attempted to deal with the coming crisis by resorting to “narrow nationalistic instincts” – for example, by building […]

Living in China’s expanding deserts – ‘We dread the sandstorms’

By Josh Haner, Edward Wong, Derek Watkins, and Jeremy White24 October 2014 In the Tengger Desert, China (The New York Times) – This desert, called the Tengger, lies on the southern edge of the massive Gobi Desert, not far from major cities like Beijing. The Tengger is growing. For years, China’s deserts spread at an […]

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