Environmentalists are 0-for-5 at the high court this term.

The National Law Journal, by Marcia Coyle, June 29

Environmentalists suffered a stunning 0-for-5 outcome in the U.S. Supreme Court this term, their "worst term ever," according to advocates and scholars.

The defeats left the environmental community, and even its traditional antagonist in these cases — the business community — wondering where the Court is heading in this increasingly important area of the law.

June 25

news.com.au -

ASTRONAUTS have captured a stunning image of a volcanic eruption blowing a hole through the clouds.

The photograph was taken from the International Space Station and captures the eruption of the Sarychev Volcano in Japan this month.

Megan Rowling | London | June 24

Reuters - Migrants uprooted by climate change in the poorest parts of the world are likely to only move locally, contrary to predictions that hundreds of millions will descend on rich countries, a study said on Wednesday.

The research from the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), a non-profit London-based think tank, challenges the common perception in the developed world that waves of refugees will try to move there permanently to escape the impact of global warming.

For example, many farmers struggling to grow enough food as seasons change will leave their homes to look for work in nearby towns for short periods only, the study said.

"It seems unlikely that the alarmist predictions of hundreds of millions of environmental refugees will translate into reality," said the paper, presented at a conference on climate change and population organised by IIED and the United Nations.

Nicholas D Kristof | NYT

Growing up on a farm near Yamhill, Ore., I quickly learned to appreciate the difference between fresh, home-grown foods and the commercial versions in the supermarket.

...

I’ve often criticized America’s health care system, and I fervently hope that we’re going to see a public insurance option this year. But one reason for our health problems is our industrialized agriculture system, and that should be under scrutiny as well.

A terrific new documentary, “Food, Inc.,” playing in cinemas nationwide, offers a powerful and largely persuasive diagnosis of American agriculture. Go see it, but be warned that you may not want to eat for a week afterward.

(It was particularly unnerving to see leftover animal bits washed over with ammonia and ground into “hamburger filler.” If you happen to be eating a hamburger as you read this, I apologize.)

Johannesburg | June 17

IRIN - It will take at least ten years to develop a variety of staple grain that will survive in the climates caused by global warming in most parts of Africa, and the continent has less than two decades in which to do it, warn the authors of a new study.

"The countries have to start developing varieties now, but many of these countries don't have breeding programmes," said Luigi Guarino, one of three authors of a study to be published on 19 June in the US journal, Global Environmental Change. "This study, we hope, at least raises the flag."

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an international scientific body, has predicted that food production in Africa could halve by 2020 as global warming pushes temperatures up and droughts become more intense.

The new study by researchers at Stanford University's Program on Food Security and the Environment, in the US, and the Rome-based Global Crop Diversity Trust, noted that "For a majority of Africa's farmers, warming will rapidly take climate not only beyond the range of their personal experience, but also beyond the experience of farmers within their own country."

_{Previously posted articles:
** Africa: The Second Scramble for Africa Starts
** Researchers urge rules to stop 'land-grabbing' worsening hunger
** Foreign land grabs for food could fuel unrest
** China's new export: farmers
** Financial crisis may worsen food crunch it eclipsed
** Rich countries launch great land grab to safeguard food supply}

Michael Day | Milan | June 16

The Independent - Global warming is already causing flooding in the north and water shortages in south, report says

The dramatic effect of climate change on the Alps comes into focus as never before this week with the publication of a major report which reveals that the mountain range is rapidly dividing into two contrasting climatic zones, each posing new problems.

The Convention on the Protection of the Alps is a statutory EU body set up in 1991 and its magisterial second report, published tomorrow, which has been seen by The Independent, reveals that the northern ranges of the Alps are suffering ever more serious flooding while the parched southern mountains see less and less snow.

According to the report, precipitation in the south-east of the region has fallen nearly 10 per cent in the past 100 years while rain and snowfall in the north-west ranges has increased by the same amount over this time.

* Michael McCarthy: Don't be fooled by this winter's powder. The Alpine snow line is already in retreat

Stephen Kurczy | Ratanakiri | June 15

Asia Times - The remoteness of Cambodia's northeast once made it an ideal hideout for Vietcong, Khmer Rouge, wildlife poachers and illegal loggers. The same isolation had in recent years drawn adventure travelers to the once jungle-covered province, which is now struggling to strike an equitable balance between eco-tourism and sustainable natural resource extraction.

After decades of civil war and lawlessness, Cambodia is now politically stable and promoting tourism to generate foreign currency earnings. Bordering Laos and Vietnam, Ratanakiri now has the infrastructure - a paved road that stops 96 kilometers from the provincial capital, Banlung - and a range of accommodations to host amateur explorers.

The Lonely Planet guidebook refers to the province as "a colorful hotchpotch of natural beauty and cultural diversity". The Wall Street Journal Asia recently labeled it "one of the last frontiers of Asian adventure travel". Those picture-perfect assessments have drawn bigger and bigger crowds: according to the Tourism Ministry, visitors to Ratanakiri surged from 6,000 in 2002 to over 105,000 in 2008.

However those expecting to find pristine forests teeming with wildlife are increasingly disappointed to find lifeless patches of freshly cut tree stumps. Officials say they are doing everything in their limited powers to protect the areas, but the market forces driving resource extraction are often too powerful to resist.

Food is the new fur for the celebrity with a conscience

Actors, designers, pop stars have all got behind the hot new ethical campaign: food. From saving species to investigating conditions for pigs, star quality is pushing it to the foreground.

The Guardian - It is, by anybody's standards, an arresting image: a truly beautiful photograph of a luscious, radiant creature, all shiny eyes and silky skin. And Greta Scacchi, who is pictured clutching the cod to her naked body, doesn't look bad either. In the months and years to come, this picture, flashed throughout the British media last week, will doubtless come to be seen as the seminal image for a particular moment, when the gruelling, knotty business of campaigning around food issues finally became sexy.

The use of celebrity skin to push an ethical issue is nothing new, of course. In the 1990s, Peta - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals - convinced a bunch of supermodels, including Naomi Campbell, to appear in the buff under the legend "I'd rather go nude than wear fur". But fur is just so passé. And, in any case, Campbell proved just how fickle the modern celebrity can be by soon deciding that actually, come to think of it, she would much rather wear fur than go nude, and did so on the catwalk in Milan.

Where celebrities are concerned, it seems, food is the new fur. The current set of images featuring Scacchi alongside actress Emilia Fox, director Terry Gilliam and actor Richard E Grant, were launched to back the cinematic release of The End Of The Line, a film about the threat of overfishing - but they are only a part of it. Tomorrow, Paul McCartney and his daughters Stella and Mary are launching a campaign to convince the public to go meat-free for one day a week. Another movie, Food Inc, which looks at the excesses and foul side-effects of industrial food production has just been released in the US and will shortly arrive here. Plus there is a major investigation by environmental campaigner Tracy Worcester into the dark underbelly of the global pig-rearing business which is about to be screened on digital channel More4. Food, and more importantly, really bad food, is hot.

What marks out these campaigns is their sophistication. It began a couple of weeks ago with the news that Nobu, the global high-end chain of Japanese restaurants favoured by the glitterati, was still serving bluefin tuna despite it being an endangered species. The restaurant had added a note to its menu pointing out the threat to the magnificent bluefin and inviting diners to ask for an alternative, but had refused to stop serving it, unlike big-name chefs such as Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver.

Annette Cary | June 11

tricityherald.com - Hanford workers are going after some of the nuclear reservation's most bizarre waste this month -- radioactive wasp nests.

There are so many radioactive nests spread over six acres by H Reactor in northern Hanford that six to 12 inches of top soil are being dug up to remove the nests.

And another 50 to 60 nests built by mud dauber wasps are spread over about 75 acres.

"We can hand dig those with a shovel and buckets," said Dave Martin, radiological engineer for Washington Closure Hanford.

The nests all were built in 2003, when a one-time series of conditions aligned. A circle about a mile wide surrounding H Reactor is the only place at Hanford believed to have the problem with radioactive mud dauber nests.

John Vidal | June 8

The Guardian - The new report confirms uncontrolled waves of violent, eco-damaging and illegal fishing activity worldwide, but with some of the biggest offences connected to the European market

Pirate fishing is out of control, depriving some the most world's most vulnerable communities of food and leading to ecological catastrophe, a three-year investigation has found.

"Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is one of the most serious threats to the future of world fisheries. It is now occurring in virtually all fishing grounds from shallow coastal waters to deep oceans. It is believed to account for a significant proportion of the global catch and to be costing developing countries up to $15bn a year," says the report by the Environmental Justice Foundation.

Unscrupulous Chinese, European and Latin American companies, using flags of convenience, are operating illegal gear, fishing in sea areas they are not allowed and are not reporting their catches, the investigators found. In addition, ships are laundering illegally caught fish by transferring them at sea to legal boats making it impossible to identify catches.

Johann Hari | June 6

The Independent - The process of trawlering is an oceanic weapon of mass destruction

In the babbling Babel of 24/7 news – where elections, bailouts and beheadings blur into one long shriek – the slow-motion stories that will define our age are often lost. An extraordinary documentary released next week, The End of the Line, forces us to stop, and see. Its story is stark. In my parents' lifetime, we have killed 90 per cent of the world's fish. In my lifetime, we will finish off the rest – unless we change our ways, fast. We are on course to be the people who wiped fish from the earth.

The story begins in the sleepy Canadian resort of Newfoundland. It was the global capital of cod, a fishing town where the scaly creatures of the sea were so abundant they could be caught with your hands. But in the 1980s, something strange happened. The catches started to wane. The fish grew smaller. And then, in 1991, they disappeared.

It turned out the cod had been hoovered out of the sea at such a rapid rate that they couldn't reproduce themselves. But the postscript is spookier still. The Canadian government banned any attempts at fishing there, on the assumption that the few remaining fish would slowly repopulate the waters. But 15 years on, they haven't. The population was so destroyed that it could never recover.

A growing number of scientists are warning that we could all be living in Newfoundland soon. Professor Boris Worm of Dalhousie University published a detailed study in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Nature saying that at the current rate, all global fish populations will have collapsed by 2048. He says: "This isn't some horror scenario, it's a real possibility. It's not rocket science if we're depleting species after species. It's a finite resource. We'll reach a point where we run out."

I caught the second half of ABC's major production on a dismal projected future for the United States due to global warming, and was very impressed to see a network put forward one expert after another with pessimistic scenarios. How refreshing to see that the real debate is more about how bad/how soon than about whether.

Excerpts from ABC's description of the special:

It seems outlandish, extreme -- even impossible. But according to cutting edge scientific research, it is a very real possibility. And unless we make drastic changes now, it could very well happen.

Experts have a stark warning: that unless we change course, the "perfect storm" of population growth, dwindling resources and climate change has the potential to converge in the next century with catastrophic results.

Les Blumenthal | June 1

McClatchy Newspapers - The Obama administration has proposed a 25 percent cut in the research and development budget for one of the most promising renewable energy sources in the Northwest — wave and tidal power.

At the same time the White House sought an 82 percent increase in solar power research funding, a 36 percent increase in wind power funding and a 14 percent increase in geothermal funding, it sought to cut wave and tidal research funding from $40 million to $30 million.

The decision to cut funding for tidal and wave power came only weeks after the Interior Department suggested that wave power could emerge as the leading offshore energy source in the Northwest and at a time when efforts to develop tidal power in Puget Sound are attracting national and international attention.

By some estimates, wave and tidal power could eventually meet 10 percent of the nation's electricity demand, about the same as hydropower currently delivers. Some experts have estimated that if only 0.2 percent of energy in ocean waves could be harnessed, the power produced would be enough to supply the entire world.

Wellington | May 28

DPA - More than 1.4 tonnes of jet fuel can be saved on a 12-hour flight powered by a new biofuel obtained from the seeds of the African jatropha plant, Air New Zealand said Thursday.

The airline said that scientists made the estimate after Air New Zealand conducted the world's first commercial aviation test flight using a 50-50 blend of jatropha fuel and standard jet fuel in a Boeing 747-400 powered by Rolls-Royce engines in December.

Captain David Morgan, Air New Zealand's chief pilot, said that the highest blend of any type of biofuel was used in that test flight, a joint initiative with Boeing and Rolls-Royce.

He said the blend would now be submitted to rigorous industry evaluation with a view to being certified for everyday use.

Morgan said the blend would save 1.43 tonnes of fuel on a Boeing 747-400 12-hour flight over 5,800 nautical miles, keeping about 4.5 tonnes of carbon-dioxide emissions out of the atmosphere.

When shorter-range flights were included, overall savings were estimated to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 60-65 per cent compared to jet fuel derived entirely from petroleum, he said.

Joshua Partlow | Quito | May 26

WaPo - Beneath the tropical jungles of northeastern Ecuador lies a vast pool of oil, representing one-fifth of the small Andean country's petroleum reserves and potentially billions of dollars in revenue. Directly above that pool, the Yasuni National Park is home to a diversity of wildlife that is among the richest on the planet, Ecuadoran and U.S. biologists say.

Faced with these two treasures, Ecuador is pursuing an unusual plan to reap the oil profits without actually drilling for oil.

The idea envisions wealthy countries effectively paying Ecuador to leave its oil -- and the carbon dioxide that would result from using it -- in the ground. Environmentalists hail the proposal as a potentially precedent-setting approach to conservation in developing countries.

Ecuador would sell certificates to governments or companies that would allow them to emit carbon dioxide in amounts corresponding to the carbon left underground in Yasuni. Proponents say the plan would help reduce overall levels of air pollution.

Paris | May 25

Reuters - Solar power plants in deserts using mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays have the potential to generate up to a quarter of the world's electricity by 2050, a report by pro-solar groups said on Monday.

The study, by environmental group Greenpeace, the European Solar Thermal Electricity Association (ESTELA) and the International Energy Agency's (IEA) SolarPACES group, said huge investments would also create jobs and fight climate change.

"Solar power plants are the next big thing in renewable energy," said Sven Teske of Greenpeace International and co-author of the report. The technology is suited to hot, cloudless regions such as the Sahara or Middle East.

The 28-page report said investments in concentrating solar power (CSP) plants were set to exceed 2 billion euros ($2.80 billion) worldwide this year, with the biggest installations under construction in southern Spain and California.

"Concentrating solar power could meet up to 7 percent of the world's projected power needs in 2030 and a full quarter by 2050," it said of the most optimistic scenario.

Marcela Valente | Buenos Aires | May 23

IPS - Thousands of visitors are drawn every year to Argentina’s southern Patagonia wilderness region to fish in glacial lakes and crystal clear streams and rivers. But the trout and salmon that they have come to find are not native species, and pose a threat to local biodiversity.

"Despite our recommendations, trout continue to be introduced into lakes and rivers in Patagonia, and we have seen in the latest bird counts that the decline in some aquatic species has been catastrophic," naturalist Claudio Bertonatti, a museum curator and a member of Argentina’s Fundación Vida Silvestre (Wildlife Foundation), told IPS.

Trout and salmon were introduced in Argentina in the early 20th century for recreational fishing in lakes and rivers in the southern provinces of Río Negro, Neuquén, Chubut, Santa Cruz and Tierra del Fuego. The species, which readily adapted to local conditions, breed without human intervention.

But as fishing tourism grew, fish farming took off. Of a total of 2,500 tons of fish raised every year in Argentina, 70 percent are rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss), one of the most sought-after species by sports fishers.

According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), trout are among the world's 100 most damaging invasive species. Once they have adapted to their new environment, trout deplete native species. Nevertheless, fishing seasons and limits are set to preserve them in Argentina’s southern provinces, to avoid a decline in tourism.

Simon Romero & Clifford Kraus | Shushufindi | May 20

NYT - Mention to Anita Ruíz the name of the giant oil company Chevron, and she trembles with rage. At her wooden hut here in the Amazon forest, where oil-project flares illuminate the night sky, she points to a portrait of her youngest son, who died seven years ago of leukemia at age 16.

Residents of Shushufindi, Ecuador, wash in the water of the Santa Fe River. The residents say toxic chemicals have leached into the soil, groundwater and streams.

“We believe the American oilmen created the pollution that killed my son,” said Ms. Ruíz, 58, who lives in a clearing where Texaco, the American oil company that Chevron acquired in 2001, once poured oil waste into pits used decades ago for drilling wells.

Texaco’s roughnecks are long gone, but black gunk from the pits seeps to the topsoil here and in dozens of other spots in Ecuador’s northeastern jungle. These days the only Chevron employees who visit the former oil fields, in a region where resentment against the company runs high, do so escorted by bodyguards toting guns.

They represent one side in a bitter fight that is developing into the world’s largest environmental lawsuit, with $27 billion in potential damages.

Les Blumenthal | Washington | May 18

McClatchy Newspapers -

_{A pair of juvenile Northern Spotted Owls at breakfast.}

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar was defiant as an aide slipped him a note during his testimony before the House interior appropriations subcommittee. Led by two Republican senators upset by the Obama administration's decision to cancel oil and gas leases near two national parks in southern Utah's Red Rock Canyon region, the Senate had just blocked the White House nominee for the No. 2 slot at the Interior Department.

Dismissing the vote as "bitter obstructionism," Salazar said he wasn't about to second-guess his decision on the Utah leases. "I have no regrets," he told the subcommittee last week.

In the nearly four months since taking office, the Obama administration has moved quickly, relentlessly and without apology to roll back the natural resource and public lands policies of its predecessor. Though they have yet to lay out their own vision in detail, Salazar and other administration officials have left no doubt that they consider the Bush approach misguided and unfairly weighted toward timber, mining, oil and other interests.

Emily Dugan | May 17

The Independent - An Indian tribe which has lost its five-year battle to save its sacred home from destruction by a British FTSE-100 mining company earlier this month, only discovered its fate on Friday. The Dongria Kondh have been living for centuries on the remote Niyamgiri Mountain in eastern India, worshipping the hill god Niyam Raja and living off the land. But an Indian Supreme Court ruling means that Vedanta, a mining company owned by the London-based Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal, can begin mining on the mountain.

Vedanta's subsidiary, Sterlite, has been given permission to begin mining bauxite, the most important aluminium ore, on land considered sacred by the tribe. Previous studies by academics, government bodies and charities have shown that an open-pit mine would destroy the habitat that has been its home for generations, destroy the forest, and cause water sources to dry up, threatening endangered animals and ecosystems.

For the people of Niyamgiri, which is situated deep in the state of Orissa, this represents a devastating blow as they rely on the land for food, culture and medicine. Kumti Majhi, a leader for the Niyamgiri people, said: "We cannot live without our god mountain and the forest, and we will continue our peaceful struggle. It is a life and death battle and the Dongria Kondh people are united on this."

Tony Paterson | May 17

The Independent -

Thanks to German conservationists, the Cold War dividing line between East and West has become a haven for wildlife.

A teenage twitcher and a small buff-coloured songbird called the whinchat were the keys that turned the Iron Curtain's landscape of barbed wire, mined death strips and Kalashnikov-toting border guards into what is probably the most enduring green success story in Europe since the Cold War. Two decades after its fall, the border between East and West Germany has already become Europe's biggest nature reserve: an 858-mile "ecological treasure trove", no longer the Iron Curtain but the Green Belt, and home to more than 600 rare and endangered species of birds, mammals, plants and insects.

But when its creators mark its 20th birthday this year, they will also be celebrating the fact that 23 European countries are currently engaged in a project to make it nearly five times as long. "The aim is to turn the Iron Curtain's entire 4,250-mile length – extending from the Arctic to the Black Sea – into what is already being called the 'Central European Green Belt'," says Dr Kai Frobel, a German ornithologist and conservationist.

_{pic:The former Iron Curtain as it passes through the Thuringian Forest}

Andy mead | Hawesville, Ky | May 16

McClatchy Newspapers - Beside a cow pasture in Hancock County, scientists are drilling through 8,000 feet of rock, hoping to learn how to lock away forever an invisible gas that threatens Earth's climate and our way of life.

Science fiction? No, but it's a science experiment that, if it works, would be carried out on a scale never before seen.

The idea is to capture the carbon dioxide, or CO2, that spews into the air when coal is burned to produce electricity. The gas, which also is produced naturally, is one of the causes of global warming.

Drilling began April 24, and the work has continued around the clock. By Thursday, when the media and officials involved in the project were invited for a first look, the drill had sunk to 3,660 feet.

In another month and a half, it will stop at 8,350 feet, in so-called "basement rock" that is more than 1 billion years old. That will make it one of the deepest wells ever drilled in Kentucky.

Tony Halpin | Moscow | May 14

TimesOnlineUK - Russia raised the prospect of war in the Arctic yesterday as nations struggle for control of the world’s dwindling energy reserves.

The country’s new national security strategy identified the intensifying battle for ownership of vast untapped oil and gas fields around its borders as a source of potential military conflict within a decade.

“The presence and potential escalation of armed conflicts near Russia’s national borders, pending border agreements between Russia and several neighbouring nations, are the major threats to Russia’s interests and border security,” stated the document, which analysed security threats up to 2020.

Bill Hanna | May 13

Star Telegram.com - It sounds like something out of science fiction: zombie fire ants. But it’s all too real.

Fire ants wander aimlessly away from the mound.

Eventually their heads fall off, and they die.

The strange part is that researchers at the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M’s AgriLife Extension Service say making "zombies" out of fire ants is a good thing.

"It’s a tool — they’re not going to completely wipe out the fire ant, but it’s a way to control their population," said Scott Ludwig, an integrated pest management specialist with the AgriLife Extension Service in Overton, in East Texas.

The tool is the tiny phorid fly, native to a region of South America where the fire ants in Texas originated. Researchers have learned that there are as many as 23 phorid species along with pathogens that attack fire ants to keep their population and movements under control.