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Category: Environment

How science got trampled in the rush to drill in the Arctic

How science got trampled in the rush to drill in the Arctic

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Adam Federman reports: Every year, hundreds of petroleum industry executives gather in Anchorage for the annual conference of the Alaska Oil and Gas Association, where they discuss policy and celebrate their achievements with the state’s political establishment. In May 2018, they again filed into the Dena’ina Civic and Convention Center, but they had a new reason to celebrate. Under the Trump administration, oil and gas development was poised to dramatically expand into a remote corner of Alaska where it had…

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NASA should focus on saving Earth

NASA should focus on saving Earth

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Lori Garver, former deputy NASA administrator, writes: In a July Pew Research Center study, 63 percent of respondents said monitoring key parts of Earth’s climate system should be the highest priority for the United States’ space agency — sending astronauts to the moon was their lowest priority, at 13 percent ; 18 percent favor Mars. The public is right about this. Climate change — not Russia, much less China — is today’s existential threat. Data from NASA satellites show that future generations here…

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Oceans are melting glaciers from below much faster than predicted, study finds

Oceans are melting glaciers from below much faster than predicted, study finds

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Inside Climate News reports: Beneath the ocean’s surface, glaciers may be melting 10 to 100 times faster than previously believed, new research shows. Until now, scientists had a limited understanding of what happens under the water at the point where ice meets sea. Using a combination of radar, sonar and time-lapse photography, a team of researchers has now provided the first detailed measurements of the underwater changes over time. Their findings suggest that the theories currently used to gauge glacier…

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How the plastics industry is fighting to keep polluting the world

How the plastics industry is fighting to keep polluting the world

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Sharon Lerner reports: The students at Westmeade Elementary School worked hard on their dragon. And it paid off. The plastic bag receptacle that the kids painted green and outfitted with triangular white teeth and a “feed me” sign won the students from the Nashville suburb first place in a recycling box decorating contest. The idea, as Westmeade’s proud principal told a local TV news show, was to help the environment. But the real story behind the dragon — as with…

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‘Nature is declining at rates unprecedented in human history,’ says director of biodiversity conservation group

‘Nature is declining at rates unprecedented in human history,’ says director of biodiversity conservation group

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The Guardian reports: From the tops of trees to the depths of the oceans, humanity’s destruction of wildlife is continuing to drive many species towards extinction, with the latest “red list” showing a third of all species assessed are threatened. The razing of habitat and hunting for bushmeat has now driven seven primates into decline, while overfishing has pushed two families of extraordinary rays to the brink. Pollution, dams and over-abstraction of freshwater are responsible for serious declines in river…

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News organizations are timidly changing their approach to covering climate crisis

News organizations are timidly changing their approach to covering climate crisis

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The New York Times reports: As Europe heats up, Greenland melts and the Midwest floods, many news organizations are devoting more resources to climate change as they cover the topic with more urgency. In Florida, six newsrooms with different owners have taken the unusual step of pooling their resources and sharing their reporting on the issue. They plan to examine how climate change will affect the state’s enormous agriculture sector as well as “the future of coastal towns and cities…

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Research on honeybees hit by Trump budget cuts

Research on honeybees hit by Trump budget cuts

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CNN reports: The US Department of Agriculture has suspended data collection for its annual Honey Bee Colonies report, citing cost cuts — a move that robs researchers and the honeybee industry of a critical tool for understanding honeybee population declines, and comes as the USDA is curtailing other research programs. It’s also another step toward undoing President Barack Obama’s government-wide focus on protecting pollinators, including bees and butterflies, whose populations have plummeted in recent years. [Continue reading…] WJLA reports: Last…

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Ecologists are racing to restore the world’s tropical rainforests

Ecologists are racing to restore the world’s tropical rainforests

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Forest restoration is underway in Biliran, Leyte, Philippines led by the local community with support from international researchers and government agencies. Robin Chazdon, CC BY-ND By Robin Chazdon, University of Connecticut The green belt of tropical rainforests that covers equatorial regions of the Americas, Africa, Indonesia and Southeast Asia is turning brown. Since 1990, Indonesia has lost 50% of its original forest, the Amazon 30% and Central Africa 14%. Fires, logging, hunting, road building and fragmentation have heavily damaged more…

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Tree planting ‘has mind-blowing potential’ to tackle climate crisis

Tree planting ‘has mind-blowing potential’ to tackle climate crisis

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The Guardian reports: Planting billions of trees across the world is by far the biggest and cheapest way to tackle the climate crisis, according to scientists, who have made the first calculation of how many more trees could be planted without encroaching on crop land or urban areas. As trees grow, they absorb and store the carbon dioxide emissions that are driving global heating. New research estimates that a worldwide planting programme could remove two-thirds of all the emissions that…

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Orangutans: Palm oil industry still threatens the lives and habitat of ‘people of the forest’

Orangutans: Palm oil industry still threatens the lives and habitat of ‘people of the forest’

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The New York Times reports: The men came at Hope and her baby with spears and guns. But she would not leave. There was no place for her to go. When the air-gun pellets pierced Hope’s eyes, blinding her, she felt her way up the tree trunks, auburn-furred fingers searching out tropical fruit for sustenance. By the end, Hope’s torso was slashed with deep lacerations. Multiple bones were broken. Seventy-four pellets were lodged in her body. Her months-old baby had…

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Environment reporters facing harassment and murder, study finds

Environment reporters facing harassment and murder, study finds

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The Guardian reports: Thirteen journalists who were investigating damage to the environment have been killed in recent years and many more are suffering violence, harassment, intimidation and lawsuits, according to a study. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which produced the tally, is investigating a further 16 deaths over the last decade. It says the number of murders may be as high as 29, making this field of journalism one of the most dangerous after war reporting. On every continent…

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How American waste crosses the globe and overwhelms the poorest nations

How American waste crosses the globe and overwhelms the poorest nations

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The Guardian reports: What happens to your plastic after you drop it in a recycling bin? According to promotional materials from America’s plastics industry, it is whisked off to a factory where it is seamlessly transformed into something new. This is not the experience of Nguyễn Thị Hồng Thắm, a 60-year-old Vietnamese mother of seven, living amid piles of grimy American plastic on the outskirts of Hanoi. Outside her home, the sun beats down on a Cheetos bag; aisle markers…

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Hundreds of new pesticides approved in Brazil under Bolsonaro

Hundreds of new pesticides approved in Brazil under Bolsonaro

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The Guardian reports: Brazil has approved hundreds of new pesticide products since its far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, took power in January, and more than 1,000 since 2016, a study has found. Many of those approved are banned in Europe. Of 169 new pesticides sanctioned up to 21 May this year, 78 contain active ingredients classified as highly hazardous by the Pesticide Action Network and 24 contain active ingredients banned in the EU, according to the study published on Wednesday by…

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Republican and Democratic former EPA heads sound alarm on Trump administration

Republican and Democratic former EPA heads sound alarm on Trump administration

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Think Progress reports: Former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials — including three Republicans and one Democrat — sounded the alarm on Tuesday about the direction of the agency under President Donald Trump. They warned that decades of environmental progress are on the line. Former EPA administrators under the Obama and Reagan administrations, as well as both Bush administrations, shared their concerns during a House Committee on Energy and Commerce hearing. “I am here today because I am deeply concerned that…

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‘Frightening’ number of plant extinctions found in global survey

‘Frightening’ number of plant extinctions found in global survey

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The Guardian reports: Human destruction of the living world is causing a “frightening” number of plant extinctions, according to scientists who have completed the first global analysis of the issue. They found 571 species had definitely been wiped out since 1750 but with knowledge of many plant species still very limited the true number is likely to be much higher. The researchers said the plant extinction rate was 500 times greater now than before the industrial revolution, and this was…

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