Record El Niño set to cause hunger for 10 million poorest, Oxfam warns

By Oliver Milman30 September 2015 (The Guardian) – At least 10 million of the world’s poorest people are set to go hungry this year because of failing crops caused by one of the strongest El Niño climatic events on record, Oxfam has warned. The charity said several countries were already facing a “major emergency”, such […]

Image of the Day: Satellite view of smoke and fires in Sumatra and Borneo, 22 September 2015

By Lynn Jenner23 September 2015 (NASA) – The widespread burning of lowland forests on Borneo as well as southern Sumatra, as seen in this image taken by the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite, is an annual, manmade occurrence. People use fires to manage agricultural lands which in this part of the world includes large […]

Poachers poison endangered Sumatran elephant and hack off tusks for ivory black market

21 September 2015 (AFP) – A critically endangered Sumatran elephant who had patrolled Indonesia’s jungles to help protect threatened habitats has been killed for his tusks, an official said Monday, sparking a surge of anger online. Yongki, a tame creature who worked with teams of elephant keepers, was found dead close to the camp where […]

Sumatran rhino declared extinct in the wild in Malaysia – ‘We’ve reached a point of no return’

By Ashley P. Taylor 31 August 2015 (LiveScience) – The Sumatran rhino is now considered extinct in the wild in the Southeast Asian country of Malaysia, according to a new study. No wild Sumatran rhinos (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis) have been found on the Malaysian peninsula since 2007, and what are thought to be the last two […]

Unrestrained rubber expansion wreaking havoc on forests – ‘I’ve personally seen vast swaths of native forest being converted into rubber plantations in southern China, Malaysia, and Cambodia’

By Shreya Dasgupta20 July 2015 (mongabay.com) – Your car tires may be treading over forests and wildlife in Southeast Asia. As the global demand for tires soars, so does the demand for natural rubber sourced from Hevea brasiliensis, the para-rubber tree. This rising demand is driving a rapid expansion of rubber plantations into biodiversity-rich forests […]

Graph of the Day: Lifetime CO2 output of proposed global coal-fired generating capacity

March 2015 (CoalSwarm / Sierra Club) – Because coal is the most carbon-intensive fossil fuel and coal plants have a long lifespan, growth in coal capacity has major implications for climate stability. From 2004 to 2013, increased coal utilization outweighed all other sources combined, producing 62 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions growth from fossil […]

There are 2,100 new coal plants being planned worldwide — enough to cook the planet

By Brad Plumer 9 July 2015 (Vox) – Earlier this week, I wrote about the global coal renaissance — arguably the most important climate-change story in the world right now. Since 2000, developing countries like China, India, Vietnam, and Indonesia have been building coal-fired power plants at a rapid pace. On the upside, this boom […]

The global coal renaissance is the most important climate story today – ‘If current trends continue, ambitious mitigation targets likely will become infeasible’

By Brad Plumer 7 July 2015 (Vox) – If you only focused on the United States, you might think coal’s days were numbered. The dirtiest of all fossil fuels once provided more than half of America’s electricity. That has since dropped to 39 percent, thanks to competition from cheap natural gas, a tireless campaign by […]

The strongest El Niño on record may be brewing in the Pacific

By Andrew Freedman9 July 2015 (Mashable) – El Niño conditions are intensifying in the tropical Pacific Ocean, potentially leading to a record event that would help control rainfall in East Africa and possibly bring desperately needed drought relief to California, while temporarily cutting off rainfall to parts of the Indonesian rainforest. A record strong event […]

Military and police board last two toothfish poaching vessels in Cabo Verde – ‘All six of the Bandit Six have been intercepted’

23 May 2015 (Sea Shepherd Global) – Military and police have boarded the last two Interpol-wanted toothfish poaching vessels, Songhua and Yongding, in Cabo Verde, an archipelago state off the northwest coast of Africa. The action took place thanks to intelligence provided to international law enforcement by Sea Shepherd, which had been gathered two days […]

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