Tag: Environment

Another Blow To The “Green Revolution”

The “Green Revolution” that lifted millions out of hunger is threatened by a fungus re-appearing in wheat and now the emergence Superweeds.

Just as the heavy use of antibiotics contributed to the rise of drug-resistant supergerms, American farmers’ near-ubiquitous use of the weedkiller Roundup has led to the rapid growth of tenacious new superweeds.To fight them, Mr. Anderson and farmers throughout the East, Midwest and South are being forced to spray fields with more toxic herbicides, pull weeds by hand and return to more labor-intensive methods like regular plowing.

Farm experts say that such efforts could lead to higher food prices, lower crop yields, rising farm costs and more pollution of land and water.

via U.S. Farmers Cope With Roundup-Resistant Weeds – NYTimes.com.

Behind the Ash Cloud Overeaction

* Attempts to measure the ash’s density were hampered because the main aircraft used by the Meteorological Office for this purpose had been grounded as it was due to be repainted.

* Computers at the Met Office, which earlier forecast a ‘barbecue summer’ last year and a mild winter for this year, produced a stream of maps predicting the ash would cover a vast area, eventually stretching from Russia to Newfoundland. But across almost all of it, there was virtually no ash at all, and none visible to satellites.

* Though there was some ash over Britain at times during the ban, the maximum density measured by scientists was only about one twentieth of the limit that scientists, the Government, and aircraft and engine manufacturers have now decided is safe.

via The ash cloud that never was: How volcanic plume over UK was only a twentieth of safe-flying limit and blunders led to lock-down | Mail Online.

Video: The Orangutan and the Hound

We can always use one of those warm and fuzzy animal stories. Hat Tip to Valerie Sanders, animal lover extraordinaire.

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more about “Orangutan and the Hound“, posted with vodpod

Greenhouse Gases: Who’s Cheating?

Consider sulfur hexafluoride (SF6), a man-made gas used to insulate transformers and other electrical equipment. It’s a potent greenhouse gas, 23,900 times more powerful than CO2. That means under cap and trade, the price you pay for the right to emit one ton of SF6 is also 23,900 higher than the price of CO2—which is now $18 per metric ton in Europe. Under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, industrialized countries report how much of the stuff they’re pumping into the atmosphere. They calculate emissions using information on how much SF6 manufacturers sell to customers and estimates of how much escapes to the atmosphere from devices or production facilities. If you believe the reports, emissions of SF6 are declining.

The reports are wrong. When researchers actually measure the chemical in the air, they find it in quantities more than three times greater than what the reported amounts would indicate—and levels are increasing, not declining. The findings were a surprise, says NOAA’s Tans: “It wasn’t on anyone’s radar screen.”

via Greenhouse Gases: Who’s Cheating? – BusinessWeek.

Long debate ended over cause, demise of ice ages – solar and earth wobble

In a publication to be released Friday in the journal Science, researchers from Oregon State University and other institutions conclude that the known wobbles in Earth’s rotation caused global ice levels to reach their peak about 26,000 years ago, stabilize for 7,000 years and then begin melting 19,000 years ago, eventually bringing to an end the last ice age.

“We can calculate changes in the Earth’s axis and rotation that go back 50 million years,” Clark said. “These are caused primarily by the gravitational influences of the larger planets, such as Jupiter and Saturn, which pull and tug on the Earth in slightly different ways over periods of thousands of years.”

That, in turn, can change the Earth’s axis – the way it tilts towards the sun – about two degrees over long periods of time, which changes the way sunlight strikes the planet. And those small shifts in solar radiation were all it took to cause multiple ice ages during about the past 2.5 million years on Earth, which reach their extremes every 100,000 years or so.

Sometime around now, scientists say, the Earth should be changing from a long interglacial period that has lasted the past 10,000 years and shifting back towards conditions that will ultimately lead to another ice age – unless some other forces stop or slow it.

via Long debate ended over cause, demise of ice ages – solar and earth wobble – CO2 not main driver « Watts Up With That?.

Freon Fix Fries The Climate

This is not the funny kind of irony: Scientists say the chemicals that helped solve the last global environmental crisis — the hole in the ozone layer — are making the current one worse.

The chemicals, called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), were introduced widely in the 1990s to replace ozone-depleting gases used in air conditioners, refrigerators and insulating foam. They worked: The earth’s protective shield seems to be recovering.

But researchers say what’s good for ozone is bad for climate change. In the atmosphere, these replacement chemicals act like “super” greenhouse gases, with a heat-trapping power that can be 4,470 times that of carbon dioxide.

Now, scientists say, the world must find replacements for the replacements — or these super-emissions could cancel out other efforts to stop global warming.

via CFC Replacements Intensify Climate Concerns Continue reading “Freon Fix Fries The Climate”

Mosquitoes Bite Mellow People

anopheles biteIf you’re one of those people whom mosquitoes tend to favor, maybe it’s because you aren’t sufficiently stressed-out.

Insects have very keen powers of smell that direct them to their targets. But for researchers trying to figure out what attracts or repels the pests, sorting through the 300 to 400 distinct chemical odors that the human body produces has proved daunting.

Dr. Logan suggests that mosquitoes may deem hosts that emit more of these chemicals to be diseased or injured and “not a good quality blood meal.” Proteins in the blood are necessary for female mosquitoes to produce fertile eggs, and Dr. Logan says it might be evolutionarily advantageous for mosquitoes to detect and avoid such people.

via Mosquito Bites: The Real Reason Some People Are Immune – WSJ.com. Continue reading “Mosquitoes Bite Mellow People”