TORONTO, ONTARIO (IFAW) – Canada’s commercial seal hunt opens off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador today, despite a lack of demand for seal products and restrictions on seal products in 34 countries. The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) questions why the Canadian government insists on wasting millions of tax dollars supporting an industry […]
By Phil Plait5 April 2013 “Against unreason, the gods themselves contend in vain.” —with apologies to Friedrich Schiller (Slate.com) – Lately I’ve been trying to write more about science, rather than write about those who attack it. I love science, and I love promoting it. It gives us wonder, knowledge, advances in technology and medicine, […]
[So much for the “recovery” of Arctic sea ice that the antiscience blogs keep predicting. –Des] By Adam Voiland29 March 2013 (NASA) – The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the Suomi NPP satellite captured this view of extensive sea-ice fracturing off the northern coast of Alaska. The event began in late-January and spread […]
By John Vidal, environment editor 25 March 2013 (guardian.co.uk) – Climate scientists have linked the massive snowstorms and bitter spring weather now being experienced across Britain and large parts of Europe and North America to the dramatic loss of Arctic sea ice. Both the extent and the volume of the sea ice that forms and […]
By Alister Doyle, Reuters Environment Correspondent, with additional reporting by Balazs Koranyi; Editing by Louise Ireland 12 March 2013 OSLO (Reuters) – A Chinese shipping firm is planning the country’s first commercial voyage through a shortcut across the Arctic Ocean to the United States and Europe in 2013, a leading Chinese scientist said on Tuesday. […]
By Stephen Leahy11 March 2013 UXBRIDGE, Canada (IPS) – “Canada is not a country, it’s winter,” Canadians say with pride. But the nation’s long, fearsome winters will live only in memory and song for Canadian children born this decade. Winters are already significantly warmer and shorter than just 30 years ago. The temperature regimes and […]
By Brad Lendon8 March 2013 (CNN) – A U.S. plan to give new protection to polar bears was voted down Thursday at an international conference on endangered species. The American delegation at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) meeting in Bangkok, Thailand, had sought a ban on […]
By Blaine Friedlander4 March 2013 (Cornell Chronicle) – If you believe that last October’s Superstorm Sandy was a freak of nature — the confluence of unusual meteorological, atmospheric and celestial events — think again. Cornell and Rutgers researchers report in the March issue of Oceanography that the severe loss of summertime Arctic sea ice — […]
By John Vidal 4 March 2013 (guardian.co.uk) – Ships should be able to sail directly over the north pole by the middle of this century, considerably reducing the costs of trade between Europe and China but posing new economic, strategic and environmental challenges for governments, according to scientists. The dramatic reduction in the thickness and […]
Arctic Nautical Charting Plan from climate central By Michael D. Lemonick27 February 2013 (Climate Central) – The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has launched a program to update some of its nautical charts, thanks largely to climate change. The revisions affect Alaska’s coast, which has America’s only Arctic seafront. As a result of global […]
