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What A Week It Was: Apocadocuments from
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climate impacts  ~ global warming  ~ contamination  ~ smart policy  ~ economic myopia  ~ ecosystem interrelationships  ~ anthropogenic change  ~ sustainability  ~ marine mammals  ~ rising sea level  ~ carbon emissions  



ApocaDocuments (11) matching "climate impacts" from this week
[see full week] ~ [see all stories tagged "climate impacts"]
Sat, Jun 20, 2009
from New Scientist:
Explore how climate change might affect the US
The White House has released a detailed report on climate change, titled Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States. The report summarises and synthesises a number of in-depth studies on both past and projected future effects of greenhouse gases on the US. It outlines projections for high-emissions and reduced-emissions scenarios.

New Scientist has compiled this Google map to show what the report has to say for various regions and cities in the US. ...


Where am I? Not near an urban area marked on this GoogleMap. Whew!

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Sat, Jun 20, 2009
from RealClimate:
Winds of change
There was an interesting AP story this week about possible changes in wind speed over the continental US. The study (by Pryor et al (sub.)), put together a lot of observational data, reanalyses (from the weather forecasting models) and regional models, and concluded that there was some evidence for a decrease in wind speeds, particularly in the Eastern US. However, although this trend appeared in the observational data, it isn't seen in all the reanalyses or regional models, leaving open a possibility that the trend is an artifact of some sort (instrumental changes, urbanization etc.).... Regardless of the cause of the indicated decline, is this likely to have a direct impact on wind power generation? There is a study by Archer and Jacobson that explores the potential for wind power over the US, and the results can be seen in this graph... Wind speed class 3 (usable for power generation) and above (dark blue, green, yellow, red and black dots) are not that widespread, and are concentrated over the plains and offshore. Comparison to the trend map in the Pryor et al study (figure 1 above) shows only a limited overlap, so even if all these sites were being used, it's not clear the trends would hamper wind-power generation much. ...


The demon doomer in me so wanted the "dying wind" meme to be true.

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Thu, Jun 18, 2009
from The Daily Green:
Even If You Don't Use Pesticides, Your Home May Harbor Them
... pesticides linger in living spaces long after they've been used to kill roaches, ants, wasps, fleas and ticks or other pests in the home, lawn and garden.... About 165 pesticide compounds are probable or possible carcinogens, according to the EPA, and a recent study linked pesticide exposure during pregnancy to leukemia. Other pesticides may mimic hormones and affect early childhood development, reproduction and other diseases. Pesticides have been linked to everything from Parkinson's disease to obesity, and they often stay on the market long after independent scientists raise serious concerns about their safety. The results were sobering: Most U.S. kitchen floors are laced with pesticides -- several known to be toxic and several that were banned decades ago. ...


Pesticides... are a pest!

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Wed, Jun 17, 2009
from Reuters:
2008 confirmed rise in weather disasters: Red Cross
A global trend toward increasing weather-related disasters was confirmed in 2008, the second deadliest year in the past decade for natural catastrophes, an annual Red Cross report said on Tuesday....More than three quarters of the disasters struck developing countries, which suffered 99 percent of the deaths, Maarten van Aalst, an author of the report, told a news conference... "In the 1990s, we saw an average of about 200 natural weather-related disasters per year. In the past decade that's been on average about 350. Last year we had 297, which is ... still well above what we've been used to in the past." ...


Kinda calls into question the whole idea of NATURAL catastrophes.

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Wed, Jun 17, 2009
from USA Today:
Clean-energy windmills a 'dirty business' for farmers in Mexico
...The isthmus -- Mexico's narrowest point -- is becoming the Saudi Arabia of alternative energy as U.S. and European companies, emboldened by new technology and high oil prices, rush to stake their claims in one of the world's windiest places. The Mexican government wants the isthmus to produce 2,500 megawatts within three years, a goal that will require thousands of windmills and would catapult Mexico into the top 12 producers of wind energy....But the energy gold rush has also brought discord, as building crews slice through irrigation canals, divide pastures and cover crops with dust. Some farmers complain they were tricked into renting their land for as little as $46 an acre annually. ...


Echoing the proverb: Sow the wind and reap the whirlwind.

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Wed, Jun 17, 2009
from Associated Press:
Ocean current experts warn of risks if eastern Gulf is opened to drilling
While Congress considers opening the eastern Gulf of Mexico to oil-and-gas drilling, experts on ocean currents warn of a potential environmental nightmare that could reach the coast of South Florida. If a rig in the eastern Gulf springs a leak, the spill could turn into an oil slick that gets caught in a fast-moving current that runs south to the Florida Keys. The current turns into the Gulf Stream, which could drag the polluted mess through the Florida Straits and carry it north to the beaches of southeast Florida. ...


Ocean currents experts...let me introduce you to a tsunami of oil greed!

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Wed, Jun 17, 2009
from Daily Climate:
White House underscores climate impact
The Obama Administration on Tuesday released a report showing climate disruption is already leaving deep imprints on every sector of the environment and that the consequences of these changes will grow steadily worse in coming decades. The 196-page report crisscrosses the United States and finds that global warming has touched every corner: Heavier downpours, strengthened heat waves, altered river flows and extended growing seasons. These changes, the report notes, will place increasing stress on water, health, energy and transportation systems and have, in several instances, already crossed tipping points to irreversible change. "This report is a game-changer," said Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Much of the foot-dragging in addressing climate change is in the perception that climate change is a ways down the road and only occurring in remote parts of the planet. "Climate change is happening now. It's happening in our own backyards. It affects you and the things you care about." ...


Can we pleeeeeeeze go back to the Denial Epoch of George W. Bush?

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Tue, Jun 16, 2009
from Guardian (UK):
Obama targets US public with call for climate action
The Obama administration is poised for its most forceful confrontation with the American public on the sweeping and life-altering consequences of a failure to act on global warming with the release today of a long-awaited scientific report on climate change. The report, produced by more than 30 scientists at 13 government agencies dealing with climate change, provides the most detailed picture to date of the worst case scenarios of rising sea levels and extreme weather events: floods in lower Manhattan; a quadrupling of heat waves deaths in Chicago; withering on the vineyards of California; the disappearance of wildflowers from the slopes of the Rockies; and the extinction of Alaska's wild polar bears in the next 75 years.... "It's a clarion call for immediate action," said Amanda Staudt, a climate scientist at the National Wildlife Federation who has seen advanced drafts of the report but not the version released today. "This report basically describes a state of emergency. It says we need to act quickly and decisively. Every state is going to be affected, and every sector of the economy." ...


"State of emergency?" From a theory?

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Tue, Jun 16, 2009
from Telegraph.co.uk:
Coastal castles could be moved inland
As sea levels threaten a number of historic properties, the government is considering ways to protect them. Historic monuments that are threatened with destruction could be moved in exceptional circumstances to a "more sustainable location", according to a consultation paper released by the Department for the Environment. Coastal defences should be improved in less severe cases and valuable assets recorded in case they are lost forever, it says.... This week the Met Office will warn of the threat of rising sea levels to Britain over the next 80 years. It is expected to warn that sea levels could rise by as much as 80cm (31 inches) around the British coast by 2100, causing the flooding of low lying areas such as Norfolk. Storm surge events around the coast could occur 20 times more frequently for some coastal areas making erosion damage worse. ...


Castles just might not be the highest priority in that situation.

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Mon, Jun 15, 2009
from Agence France-Presse:
Lifestyle melts away with Uganda peak snow cap
In 1906, Mount Speke, one the highest peaks of Uganda's Rwenzori Mountains was covered with 217 hectares (536 acres) of ice, according to the Climate Change Unit at Uganda's ministry of water and environment. In 2006, only 18.5 hectares remained. Satellite images taken in 1987 and again in 2005 show that much of the thaw has occurred over the past two decades... "The ice is literally disappearing. In some cases it has disappeared, and I am more than certain that this is a result of global warming," said Philip Gagwe, who heads the Climate Change Unit. "Man-made global warming is here. We are smelling it and we are touching it." ...


That peak is u-GONE-da.

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Mon, Jun 15, 2009
from Associated Press:
Are fireflies leaving?
In parts of the world where firefly populations have been monitored for a long time, such as Japan, their numbers are down. And scientists think the same might be true in the United States. "You hear people saying, growing up I saw fireflies all the time, now I don't see them anymore," says Christopher Cratsley, a professor at Fitchburg State College in Massachusetts who studies them. Are fireflies disappearing? Answering that question is part of the goal of Firefly Watch, based at the Museum of Science in Boston. In the first year of the program last year, more than 1,400 people provided their own observations from as far away from Boston as Texas, Kansas and even India. ...


Maybe they're still around, but lighting less -- to conserve energy!

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