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Majority Leader Reid Introduces Plan to Prevent Future Oil Spills

Posted by davebishop on Wednesday, 28 July 2010 in Oil Spill

Some positive news from the oil spill. Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nevada) today introduced a Clean Energy jobs and Oil Spill Accountability Plan. The following is a statement by Sarah Chasis, Director of the Oceans Program at the Natural Resources Defense Council: “The BP disaster in the Gulf is a sober...

Lawsuit Filed to Protect Gulf’s Whales and Turtles

Posted by ep-admin on Wednesday, 28 July 2010 in Oil Spill

Interior Department Failed to Analyze Oil-Spill Risk The Center for Biological Diversity today filed a lawsuit against Interior Secretary Ken Salazar for failing to assess possible impacts on the Gulf of Mexico's endangered whales and sea turtles of a large oil spill resulting from drilling...

Battle to save Gulf sea turtles from oily death

Posted by ep-admin on Wednesday, 28 July 2010 in Oil Spill

While BP struggles to finally seal the leaking Gulf of Mexico oil well, an equally desperate battle has been enjoined on the surface to save endangered sea turtles from meeting an oily grave. Jane Lubchenco, head of the US government's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), said Tu...

Banning Shark Fins from Shark Fin Soup

Posted by ep-admin on Wednesday, 28 July 2010 in Earth Violators

A law prohibiting the possession, sale and distribution of shark fins goes into effect in the state of Hawaii. Hailed as a victory, albeit a small one, by conservationists, this law nevertheless is a major step in recognizing the need for government action to help save the shark. Sought afte...

ANOTHER Oil Spill: 800,000 gallons in Kalamazoo River

Posted by ep-admin on Tuesday, 27 July 2010 in Earth Violators

More than 800,000 gallons of oil have been released into a creek in Marshall that feeds the Kalamazoo River.Houston-based Enbridge Energy Partners said Monday that oil flowed into the Talmadge Creek and the Kalamazoo River after a leak developed in its pipeline.Enbridge said the 30-inch pipeline tra...

Overpopulation is the Wrong Focus For Environmentalists

Posted by plantitfilm on Monday, 26 July 2010 in Human Health

A green myth is on the march. It wants to blame the world’s over-breeding poor people for the planet’s peril. It stinks. And on World Population Day, I encourage fellow environmentalists not to be seduced. The actor Jeremy Irons has announced that he plans to make an Al-Gore style...

Senators criticize delay on climate plan

Posted by plantitfilm on Monday, 26 July 2010 in Earth Violators

AUGUSTA -- U.S. Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins both expressed disappointment with the recent decision by Senate Democratic leadership to set aside plans for comprehensive climate change legislation. The Maine Republicans each had showed support for limited or modified plan...

The Baltic Sea: Spring Algae Blooms

Posted by ep-admin on Saturday, 24 July 2010 in Ocean/Seas/Coastlines

Record summer temperatures, farm fertilizers and a lack of wind have created a gigantic carpet of evil-smelling weed covering large areas of the Baltic and threatening both marine life and seaside tourism, scientists warn. The 377,000 sq km of blue-green algae, covering an area the size of Germany,...

Climate change threatens poverty fight

Posted by ep-admin on Saturday, 24 July 2010 in Human Health

Climate change threatens to undo years of work to tackle poverty in developing countries, a report warned today. The study by Forum for the Future and supported by the Department for International Development (DFID) said strong, urgent action was needed in poor countries to address the impacts of c...

Great Power Race

Posted by ep-admin on Friday, 23 July 2010 in Sustainable Development

Today, the Senate failed yet again to bring forward a comprehensive climate and clean energy bill. Could what’s missing be a healthy sense of competition?350.org just released a new video to jump-start the Great Power Race, a clean energy competition between students in China, India and the US. The ...

Will high petrol prices help the environment?

Posted by plantitfilm on Friday, 23 July 2010 in Fossil Fuels

High gas prices mean less demand and less pollution at least in theory, right? Not necessarily, finds Mark Jansen. Our relationship with our cars is far more complex... High petrol prices are bad news for drivers, which means almost all of us, but those who care about carbon emissions...

Jordan River To Polluted For Baptism

Posted by plantitfilm on Thursday, 22 July 2010 in Lakes/Rivers/Wetlands

An environmental group on Wednesday called for a halt to baptisms in the Jordan River where tradition holds that Jesus was baptised, saying the waters there were dangerously polluted. "Friends of the Earth Middle East call on regional authorities to halt baptism in the lower Jordan River unti...

Why can't the automobile industry get a handle on low-carbon cars?

Posted by ep-admin on Thursday, 22 July 2010 in Transportation

The answer's in the profit margins - which is why the credit crunch offers hope for the future, says Harriet Williams Last summer, Friends of the Earth Europe parked an old-style 1948 VW Beetle next to the brand-new model in front of the European Parliament in Brussels. The human genome has been s...

Obama sets plan for oceans, Great Lakes

Posted by ep-admin on Thursday, 22 July 2010 in Water Conservation

As his administration contends with the BP Plc oil spill, Obama was to sign an executive order creating a single National Ocean Council to make sense of the huge number of rules from different agencies on the use of U.S. coastal waters and the Great Lakes. The plan, the final recommendation...

New 'walking' fishes discovered in Gulf oil-spill zone

Posted by ep-admin on Wednesday, 21 July 2010 in Oil Spill

Two new fish species — with pancake-flat bodies, wiggling lures on their faces, and elbowed fins for “walking” on the seafloor — have been discovered in the path of spewing Gulf of Mexico oil. Picture Courtesy of AMNH One of these pancake batfishes lives in the northern Gulf wh...

Countries pledge global support for clean energy

Posted by plantitfilm on Wednesday, 21 July 2010 in Sustainable Development

By Jasmin Melvin and Alina Selyukh (Reuters) - The United States and dozens of other countries have pledged hundreds of millions of dollars toward clean energy initiatives to help battle climate change, U.S. Energy Secretary Stephen Chu said on Tuesday. Meeting in Washington, D....

After Oil Spills, Hidden Damage Can Last for Years

Posted by plantitfilm on Wednesday, 21 July 2010 in Oil Spill

On the rocky beaches of Alaska, scientists plunged shovels and picks into the ground and dug 6,775 holes, repeatedly striking oil — still pungent and dangerous a dozen years after the Exxon Valdez infamously spilled its cargo. More than an ocean away, on the Breton coast of France, scientists surve...

Destroying the Environment considered a Sin

Posted by ep-admin on Wednesday, 21 July 2010 in Sustainable Development

VATICAN CITY — A Vatican keen to show its green side has added pollution to the realm of "new sins" that today's Catholics must confront and avoid.In this age of expanding globalization, the Vatican is telling followers that sin is not just an individual act but can also be a transgression against t...

Greenpeace's Kumi Naidoo: From Liberating South Africa to Saving Planet Earth

Posted by ep-admin on Tuesday, 20 July 2010 in Environmental Heroes

By Nell Greenberg, Earth Island Journal Kumi Naidoo is the real thing. Naidoo, who became the Executive Director of Greenpeace International in November 2009, is not your typical career environmentalist. He became an activist at just 15 years old in apartheid South Africa. As a result of hi...

Climate change to blame for hottest summer ever?

Posted by ep-admin on Tuesday, 20 July 2010 in Climate Change

The first six months of 2010 brought a string of warmest-ever global temperatures, but connecting these dots to long-term climate change patterns remains frustratingly difficult, experts say. Not only was last month the hottest June ever recorded, it was the fourth consecutive month in which t...