Reporting by Denis Pinchuk; Writing in Moscow by Lidia KellyST. PETERSBURG, RussiaSat Mar 27, 2010 10:22am EDT Around 200 people gathered in St. Petersburg, thousands of kilometers away from the lake, demanding to revoke the government’s January decision to restart Baikal Paper Mill. Another 500 rallied closer to Baikal, which holds a fifth of the […]
By now, most of us are aware that there is a large patch of floating plastic in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. What you may not know is that it’s not made up of plastic bags and empty bottles. It’s made up of billions of tiny pieces of plastic, and it’s basically invisible unless […]
ScienceDaily (Mar. 26, 2010) — The economic growth across much of Asia comes with a troubling side effect: pollutants from the region are being wafted up to the stratosphere during monsoon season. The new finding, in a study led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, provides additional evidence of the global nature […]
By BRIAN SKOLOFF (AP) WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Coral reefs are dying, and scientists and governments around the world are contemplating what will happen if they disappear altogether. The idea positively scares them. Coral reefs are part of the foundation of the ocean food chain. Nearly half the fish the world eats make their […]
By Brandon Keim Email AuthorMarch 23, 2010 | 8:00 pm Scientists and policymakers are meeting this week to discuss whether geo-engineering to fight climate change can be safe in the future, but make no mistake about it: We’re already geo-engineering Earth on a massive scale. From diverting a third of Earth’s available fresh water to […]
By NICK O’MALLEY INVESTIGATIONSMarch 19, 2010 THE massive expansion of the mining industry in the Upper Hunter Valley is making people sick, say concerned residents who have campaigned for a decade for the government to establish independent air-quality monitoring and to conduct a proper health study. One resident, Di Gee, from Jerrys Plains, worries that […]
“The stream was 50 meters from our house and chemicals were dumped into it. Oh, it stank! The water ran like a natural stream, but it was warm toxic waste water. We had headaches, dizziness, stomachaches…. Our children loved to fish and swim in the river. They came home covered in crude. We fried the […]
HONG KONGMon Mar 22, 2010 10:38am EDT (Reuters) – Hong Kong’s harbor was cloaked in thick smog on Monday as air pollution soared to record levels ahead of the Hong Kong Sevens rugby tournament this weekend, the city’s premier sporting event. Taiwan, too, was hit by what are being called the worst sandstorms in 25 […]
Reporting by Elias Biryabarema; Editing by Kevin Liffey KAMPALA (Reuters) – Pollution in parts of Lake Victoria is worsening so fast that soon it may be impossible to treat its waters enough to provide drinking water for the Ugandan capital, a senior official said Monday. The lake, east Africa’s largest by area, also supplies water […]
Reporting by Tim Cocks; editing by Ralph Boulton ABIDJAN (Reuters) – Human beings are flushing millions of tonnes of solid waste into rivers and oceans every day, poisoning marine life and spreading diseases that kill millions of children annually, the U.N. said on Monday. “The sheer scale of dirty water means more people now die […]
