Covering Environmental Issues and Green News | The Earth Times
Sun Apr 24 04:21:27 EDT 2011
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Greenpeace calls cloud dirty - Greenpeace published on April 20 a report on the energy choices of the largest IT companies involved in the emerging 'cloud computing' segment. According to the report, these companies are increasing society's dependance on dirty energy even as the concept of the cloud itself promises a greener world by enabling smart grids, telecommuting and other services and new ways of doing so many things.

Geoengineering is a leap from the fire into the frying pan - Recent geoengineering conferences have raised the profile of how we might tackle global warming with a Plan B - finding ways to cool the planet down, whilst trying to agree on how to cut those pesky CO2 emissions. But could the Plan B of geoengineering be a dangerous distraction that ultimately locks us into a series of even greater risks?

Alien invasion of the Antarctic - New research looks at the risk of biological invasion with fresh produce in the Antarctic region. With an exponentially increasing population of tourists and researchers, the Antarctic region is currently at increasing risk of non-native species introductions.

Google invests in world's largest solar power tower plant - The investment of $168 million is the single largest by the Internet giant into clean energy. Google has invested almost $170 million in the world's largest solar power tower plant, being built in America's Mojave Desert. Part of Google's ongoing commitment to clean energy solutions, the investment is its largest so far in a single project

Toxic chemicals found in peregrine falcon eggs - Scientists have discovered flame retardant chemicals in peregrine falcon eggs. The study looked at eggs that had failed to hatch in falcon nests around Spain and Canada, including the Great Lakes Region. It was discovered that the levels of chemical compounds were higher in the eggs of birds living in coastal environments.

Scottish first marine reserve reaping rewards of protection - Scotland's first marine reserve, established only two years ago in Lamlash Bay in Arran is already showing positive benefits as the seabed recovers from the impact of destructive scallop dredging. More juvenile scallops are thriving in the no fishing zone, and adults are growing bigger and will seed surrounding areas.

Much of ancient Martian atmosphere frozen at poles - Mars may well have had a much denser CO2-rich atmosphere hundreds of thousands of years ago - one with wilder dust storms and that was more likely to support running water. That's the claim coming from a new analysis of satellite radar data over the Martian southern ice cap - published in Science today - which hints at a thick wedge of frozen CO2 there that contains 30 times the 'dry ice' of previous estimates.

Sea cow teeth point to a wetter Eocene and a 'greenhouse earth' - Sea cow teeth from 50 million years ago are helping scientists to flesh out the climate of the earth during the Eocene, a time when greenhouse conditions reined supreme. Their paper, published today in Science, confirms that very wet conditions extended right down to the tropics, where rainfall rates were much greater than that seen today.

Hydrogen fuel-cells get a boost with a cheap catalyst makeover - Hydrogen-powered cars, laptops and mobiles could be a step closer, thanks to the discovery of a practical - and cheap - alternative to sky-high priced platinum. Platinum is currently the best catalyst for hydrogen fuel-cells. But the new carbon-iron-cobalt catalyst, described in today's Science, works as well as platinum, and its low cost could pull hydrogen power out of the shadows into a brighter renewable future.

Ozone hole's long reach brings climate change to the tropics - The ozone hole over Antarctica could be causing the tropics to have wetter summers, increasing flooding and landslide risks, according to recent research published today in Science. A team from Columbia University has found that the ozone hole is helping to shift the jet streams south, making parts of the tropics much rainier than they were before. The results imply it is not just greenhouse gases that can change the climate.

Plenty more fish in the sea? Not in the Mediterranean - Our insatiable appetite is devastating fish populations in the Mediterranean. The report documents the first comprehensive assessment of native marine species for an entire sea; an enormous undertaking. Almost half the species of Mediterranean sharks and rays are threatened, in addition to at least 12 other fish species. The main threats to fish populations in this region are - predictably and sadly - overfishing and pollution.

Child IQ loss linked to pesticides exposure in womb - A long-term study of 300 children over several years has seen lower levels of intelligence follow-on for those children whose mothers were exposed to pesticides during pregnancy. Three separate papers, published in Environmental Health Perspectives, confirm this effect for a range of environments. But this can be avoided if mothers wash fresh food thoroughly - or go for organic whenever possible - during pregnancy.

Democratic / Republican voter schism over global warming deepens - The way that US citizens vote is now a major factor in their belief in global warming - with a wide majority of Republicans not seeing climate change as 'here and now', compared to a tiny minority of Democrats who deny that global warming as already upon us. That's the conclusion of a study published in Sociological Quarterly. It shows that the split is widening, and is being driven by a more polarized political debate amongst political leaders, which has pulled the public along in its divisive wake.

Rapid increase in ice loss from the Canadian Arctic - The vast Canadian archipelago of Arctic islands, the territory of Nunavut, covers an area the size of western Europe. New research shows that the melting ice caps and glaciers there play a much greater role in global sea level rise than previously believed - 1mm in only 6 years.

Carbon counting in the USA - with a ground-breaking new biomass map - An incredibly detailed three dimensional map of the 'green architecture' of the US, including forest canopy heights and vegetation levels down to each hectare, has been released today by the Woods Hole Research Center. The fruit of five years labor, which is freely downloadable, paints a detailed snapshot of the carbon stocks above the soil, one that will aid forest managers, ecologists and climate scientists for years to come.