Monthly Archives: September 2008
Peru: Warming to Spur Potato Famine in the Andes?
National Geographic: When Tito Guillen Rosales was a young boy, his grandfather was a rich man, growing 50 bags of potatoes a year and sharing his surplus with community members who didn’t have enough. "But now his potatoes are covered with worms and plagues and he barely has enough to feed himself," said Rosales, [...]
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Uganda: Hunger Looms As Climate Change Runs Out of Control
Monitor: Many Ugandans may not be aware of the ongoing climate changes but its effects are already threatening lives of many people countrywide. The issue has dominated the international public discourse for the past few years with catch phrases such as global warming and green house gas emissions becoming part of everyday vocabulary. [...]
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HIV/AIDS Emerged as Early as 1880s
National Geographic: The AIDS pandemic in humans originated at least three decades earlier than previously thought, and it may have been triggered by rapid urbanization in west-central Africa during the early 20th century, according to an international team of researchers. A better understanding of the conditions that helped fuel the pandemic could be key [...]
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Australia Climate Plan Must Be Realistic – Adviser
Reuters: Australia’s planned emissions trading scheme and ambitions for a new post-Kyoto international climate pact must be cautious and realistic, says the government’s chief climate adviser. Ross Garnaut, asked by the centre-left government to design an emissions trade scheme to make the US$1 trillion economy less polluting, hands his final report to Prime Minister [...]
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France Proposes Phasing in CO2 Curbs for Cars
Reuters: European Union President France proposed on Tuesday watering down plans to curb greenhouse gas emissions from cars by phasing in limits up to 2015, with lower fines for narrowly missing the target. The EU’s Commission has called for CO2 cuts from cars of 18 percent to 130 grams per km by 2012, as [...]
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United Kingdom: Turbines ‘no risk to farm birds’
BBC: Wind turbines pose less of a risk to farmland birds than previously thought, a study has concluded. A team of UK scientists said their research showed that building new wind farms on European farmland would not adversely affect bird populations. Previous studies highlighted how turbine blades were hazardous for waterbird and bird [...]
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Australia Climate Adviser: Scheme Need Not Boost CPI
Reuters: Australia’s 2010 carbon emissions scheme would not be inflationary if permit revenue was used to offset increased costs, the government’s top climate adviser said in his final report on the scheme released Tuesday. Ross Garnaut also said the Australia should allocate A$1 billion to the power industry, dominated by coal-fired generators, to help [...]
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United Kingdom: Tenants to demand energy efficiency improvements
Business Green: The market for insulation and other domestic energy-efficiency improvements should receive a further boost from next month, with the introduction of legislation that will require landlords to show tenants the Energy Performance Certificate score for their property. That is the conclusion of a new survey from the Energy Saving Trust, which found [...]
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US aid agency denies contraceptives for Africa
People and Planet: The US Agency for International Development (USAID) has instructed its staff to force governments in several African countries to discontinue the provision of US-funded contraceptive supplies from a leading non-government agency – a decision which, the NGO warns, is likely lead to more abortions and deaths in several East African countries. [...]
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Southern California ports clean up polluting trucks
Reuters: The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, comprising the busiest U.S. cargo complex, launched a landmark clean-air program on Wednesday banning some 2,000 older trucks blamed for half the pollution spewed by the ports’ diesel haulers. The port complex ranks as the biggest air pollution source in Southern California. Heavy-duty trucks contribute [...]
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Small sacrifice can save the planet
Sydney Morning Herald: AUSTRALIANS will be driving clean electric cars, giving up their lamb roast and rump steaks for chicken and pork, living in higher-density cities and swapping cheap air flights for interstate trains. In the outback, millions of beef cattle and sheep will disappear from the marginal rangelands, farmers will grow grasses and [...]
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Brazil announces new measures to stem Amazon assault
WWF: Brazil has announced new measures designed to stem an accelerating assault on the Amazon’s rainforests – on the same day as the nation’s space agency released figures showing that 756km2 of Amazon forest were cleared in August, triple the 230km2 cleared in August 2007. Heading a list of a dozen new measures, Brazilian [...]
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Australians urged to eat kangaroo in order to reduce emissions
BBC: An Australian government adviser on climate change has urged Australians to ditch beef and lamb for kangaroo steaks to help save the planet. Sheep and cows produce a high amount of environmentally unfriendly methane gas through belching and flatulence. But economist Ross Garnaut noted in a report on global warming that kangaroos [...]
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Climate Change ‘Low on List of SA Concerns’