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May 31, 2007

NASA Chief Not Concerned About Global Warming

I've always considered it arrogant of humankind to burn enough fossil fuel to kill off half the earth's species. But the NASA chief would call me arrogant for judging. What's really arrogant, he says, is assuming that climate change won't be for the better. So NASA doesn't prioritize studying climate change from space in its $17 billion budget.

NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, a Bush appointee, tells NPR:

I have no doubt that...a trend of global warming exists. I am not sure that it is fair to say that it is a problem we must wrestle with.... I would ask which human beings—where and when—are to be accorded the privilege of deciding that this particular climate that we have right here today, right now is the best climate for all other human beings. I think that's a rather arrogant position for people to take.

Right. Why won't future generations be better off after the sixth great extinction? What's wrong with displacing 1 billion of the world's poorest people? Who are we to judge?

Criminal Charges Against Pfizer In Nigeria

Nigeria is bringing criminal charges against Pfizer pharmaceuticals in the wake of its 1996 drug testing during a meningitis epidemic. The Washington Post reports that authorities filed eight charges this month, including counts of criminal conspiracy and voluntarily causing grievous harm. They also filed a civil lawsuit seeking more than $2 billion in damages from the world's largest drug company.

The move represents a rare -- perhaps unprecedented -- instance in which the developing world's anger at multinational drug companies has boiled over into criminal charges. The government alleges that Pfizer researchers selected 200 children and infants from crowds at a makeshift epidemic camp in Kano and gave about half of the group an untested antibiotic called Trovan. Researchers gave the other children what the lawsuit describes as a dangerously low dose of a comparison drug made by Hoffmann-La Roche. Nigerian officials say Pfizer's actions resulted in the deaths of an unspecified number of children and left others deaf, paralyzed, blind or brain-damaged. The lawsuit says that the researchers did not obtain consent from the children's families and that the researchers knew Trovan to be an experimental drug with life-threatening side effects that was "unfit for human use." Parents were banned from the ward where the drug trial occurred, the suit says, and the company left no medical records in Nigeria.

Here's a link to a bunch of MoJo coverage of Big Pharma's trixsy ways. --JULIA WHITTY

Extinction Stinks

NASA Finds Earth's Climate Approaching Dangerous Point

NASA and Columbia University Earth Institute research finds that human-made greenhouse gases have brought the Earth's climate close to critical tipping points. Using climate models, satellite data, and paleoclimate records, the scientists conclude that the West Antarctic ice sheet, Arctic ice cover, and regions providing fresh water sources and species habitat are under threat from continued global warming. Lead author James Hansen, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York, concludes: "If global emissions of carbon dioxide continue to rise at the rate of the past decade, this research shows that there will be disastrous effects, including increasingly rapid sea level rise, increased frequency of droughts and floods, and increased stress on wildlife and plants due to rapidly shifting climate zones."

Meanwhile, GW Bush appears to have woken from his Rip-Van-Winkle slumber and is proffering ideas to the world that the world has already processed & left to the dust of history. Somebody give him a cup of coffee, please, and brief him on the fact the G-8 already has proposals on the table ready to be acted on NOW. The only thing holding them up? His administration. --JULIA WHITTY

May 30, 2007

Eat Less Meat To Save The Planet, Brits Say

Eating less meat and dairy could help tackle climate change by reducing the amount of methane gas emitted by cows and sheep. Reuters reports on an email leaked to a vegetarian campaign group, Viva, wherein a British Environment Agency official expressed sympathy for the green benefits of a vegan diet, which bans all animal product foods. The official said the government may in future recommend eating less meat as one of the "key environmental behaviour changes" needed to combat climate change… Blimey, the Brits threaten to take the lead again. --JULIA WHITTY

The Worldbike: Cargo-Carrying Bicycle Designed For Africa

Alex Steffen blogs at WorldChanging on the Worldbike--a cargo-carrying bicycle designed for Africa, where most bikes are used by small entrepreneurs to transport goods for a living. Now, Steffen reports, the bike has appeared in the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum exhibit, "Design for the Other 90%." According to WorldBike:

The Worldbike [is] a new platform for developing world bicycle entrepreneurs. With a lighter weight, stronger frame, V-brakes for stopping power, an ergonomic seat and riding position, a seven-speed drivetrain for hill climbing and integrated cargo racks, the Worldbike is the bike people are calling out for in developing countries. Why hasn’t it been built before? Because American recreational customers are the singular focus of the bicycle industry. But things are changing. The Design for the Other 90% is one example of a growing awareness of the importance of developing products that can assist the world’s poor.

In my perfect world: You could only shop at CostCo if you carried back what you bought on one of these… --JULIA WHITTY

Swedish Cancers Traced To Chernobyl

The incidence of cancer in northern Sweden increased following the accident at the nuclear power plant in Chernobyl in 1986. This was the finding of a study from Linköping University in Sweden that asked: Was the increase in cancer caused by the radioactive fallout from Chernobyl or could it be explained by other circumstances? In two studies using different methods, Martin Tondel showed a small but statistically significant increase in the incidence of cancer in northern Sweden, where the fallout of radioactive cesium 137 was at its most intense… --JULIA WHITTY

May 29, 2007

Breaking: Humpbacks Are Almost Home

The two lost whales have picked up the pace and are now within 10 miles of Golden Gate. The injured mother and her calf have made good time since we followed them last week, 90 miles up the river in Sacramento. They're nearly home to the Pacific Ocean.

California's Open Space Program at Risk

The governor of California has done some very green things. But his latest budget proposal seems less green in that it might very well spur development on farmland. The Ethicurian alerts us to an editorial in the San Francisco Chronicle pointing out that the governor wants the state to save $40 million by cutting funding for the WIlliamson Act, which reimburses counties for giving property tax breaks on agricultural land. The only problem with the Williamson Act is it doesn't do nearly enough. Read a good discussion here.

Public Health Officials Warn of Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis Strain

A man flew back and forth on commercial flights across the Atlantic before landing in an isolation ward, diagnosed with a particularly virulent and drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis. The case is so serious that the director of the Centers for Disease Control, Dr. Julie Gerberding, announced the matter herself, and issued a federal quarantine order.

Interesting facts from the New York Times story:

Tuberculosis kills about 1.6 million people each year worldwide.... At any given time, one person in three worldwide is infected with dormant tuberculosis germs, according to the World Health Organization. People become ill when the bacteria become active, usually when a person’s immunity declines, whether because of advancing age, HIV infection or some other medical problem.

That's why we called it "the Patient Predator." For more, read this terrifying essay by Kevin Patterson in Mother Jones. He writes:

Tuberculosis infection has been so prevalent that for most of human history it was an almost normal, if often lethal, part of the human bio-niche.... The most devastating infection in the world is not Ebola or Lyme disease, West Nile virus or even HIV, but tuberculosis.

How To Spare Polar Bears The Bullet

Polar bears are in trouble from global warming, melting ice, and toxins in the marine foodweb. Do they really need to be hunted too? No, says the Humane Society of the United States, Defenders of Wildlife, and the International Fund for Animal Welfare. The three groups have called on the Senate to act on bipartisan legislation to close a loophole in the Marine Mammal Protection Act. This loophole currently allows wealthy American trophy hunters to bring the heads and hides of hundreds of imperiled polar bears into the United States from the Canadian Arctic.

The legislation, S. 1406, to close the loophole in the law was introduced by U.S. Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), and by U.S. Reps. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) and Frank LoBiondo (R-N.J.) as H.R. 2327 in the House of Representatives.

"The polar bear has become a tragic symbol of our threatened environment, and of the wildlife that pays the price for dangerous practices," Sen. Kerry said. "It's time to put the polar bear on the Endangered Species List, and give them a fighting chance at survival. But it also means that we must close the loophole that allows for trophy hunting by U.S. sport hunters in Canada. Not only must these bears contend with their home melting away, but they are also being hunted in the limited habitat they have left. It's time to take responsibility for their survival. We need to pick up the pieces and change our practices, before it's too late."

HSUS asks those who agree with this legislation to contact their reps in DC & urge them to close the loophole. --JULIA WHITTY

Fight Takes Shape at International Whaling Commission Meeting

The annual International Whaling Commission Meeting is underway in Anchorage, Alaska. Hardy Jones of Bluevoice reports in his blog what’s at stake this crucial year.

The votes will be close. The Japanese have bought more than a dozen small nations and thus threaten to open the doors to legal whaling for the first time in twenty years. Since 1987 Japan and other nations like Iceland and Norway have only been able to conduct whaling under an article in the IWC treaty that allows for scientific whaling. Of course Japan has exploited that loophole to do pseudo-science and then sell the meat from the whales they have “researched” by harpooning and cutting them into steaks… The twenty-year moratorium on whaling, which went into effect in 1987 and was the cause of joyous celebration among those of us who love whales, is set to expire. And several nations, along with their prostitute allies, will be seeking to open the world to legal whaling.

The IWC is a perverse organization--a huge room full of men and a few women sitting down to determine the life or death of whales swimming thousands of miles away in the Antarctic or in the North Atlantic. The most odious plan Japan has brought forth is to kill humpback whales in the Antarctic. The issue will be raised Wednesday. We will follow this closely as it represents spitting in the face of tens of thousands of people around the world who not only love these whales in aggregate but know them personally, individually and marvel each year when the whales return on their migrations to Moorea, New Zealand, Australia, Tonga, Rurutu, Raritonga, New Caledonia and other areas of the Southern Ocean.

Fingers crossed, emails ready to fire… we’ll be following closely. --JULIA WHITTY

Overseas Foods To Lose Organic Status in UK?

Food flown into the UK may be stripped of organic status because of concern about greenhouse gas emissions. The move is being considered by the Soil Association, which certifies what foods are organic, reports the BBC. Due to growing demands to cut the environmental impact of food distribution, the organization is considering five options to reduce the carbon footprint of air-freighted food, including an outright ban, or showing a product's country of origin, and/or carbon offsetting schemes.

Let’s hope the UK gives this overdue boost to local foods (check out more on this movement in "No Bar Code," Mother Jones, May/Jun 2006)… And for some really interesting developments on this much-needed front, Mark Heffernan in Wisconsin tells me of some community-based food systems in his area, as well as fascinating developments in the field of vertical farming, designed to feed urban populations… Wow. Food never looked so sci-fi. --JULIA WHITTY

Elephant Herds Found On Isolated Sudanese Island

Wildlife experts have located hundreds of wild elephants on a treeless island in the swamps of south Sudan. The herds have avoided unchecked hunting in this isolated sanctuary during more than 20 years of war, reports Reuters. "We flew out of a cloud, and there they were. It was like something out of Jurassic Park," said Tom Catterson, working on a US-funded environment programme in south Sudan. Environmentalists are keeping the location of the island secret to prevent poachers from killing the animals… Life is resilient. Hopefully more than we ever get to know. --JULIA WHITTY

The Case of the Missing Bees: It's the Flowers, Dummy

Today's Salon features a round-table discussion that's the real bees' knees on the disappearing bee problem. The scientists seem to agree that the precipitous drop-off in domesticated honeybee populations (no one keeps track of wild bee populations) was likely caused, at least in part, by the unavailability of nutritious pollen. (The theory that cellphones are doing it didn't get much traction.) Jeffery Pettis, who heads the research program at the USDA's honeybee lab, observes that "all pollinators -- which rely on a diversity of flowers -- are in decline." Eric Mussen, of the Honey Bee Research Facility at the University of California at Davis, explains:

Honeybees rely on pollen for protein, vitamins, fats and minerals. …If we are having a typical year, and the rains come, there aren't too many places in the United States where the bees cannot find their mix of pollens to meet their dietary needs. …What happens when…you get this blast of hot temperature [at] about the time the flower buds are forming and the pollen grains are beginning to form[?] …You get sterile pollen.

Lack of sufficient food leaves honeybees with compromised immune systems, making them vulnerable to parasites. Honeybees play a major role in the agricultural production of fruit and nuts. Mussen puts it this way:

Bees are a necessary part of our food production. If we don't grow our own cherries and apples, can't we just buy them somewhere else? The answer is yes. But do we want to become as dependent on foreign nations for our food as we are dependent on them for fuel?

The disappearing bees also point to another problem, explains Wayne Esaias, a NASA climatologist and amateur beekeeper. We don't have any idea how climate change will affect blooming trees:

[E]cologists in general have not paid attention to the timing of blooming and nectar availability and quality of pollen.… As a kind of a climatologist, I'm getting paid to study the impact of potential global warming scenarios on our ecology. There's a lot of research being done on carbon cycling, but without information about when the plants bloom and how the quality of the flora changes, we are in a poor position to assess the effect of changes in temperature and rainfall on our ecosystems.

In other words, the models, which are already predicting disaster, aren't even accurate because we have immense gaps in our knowledge of the interconnectedness of plants and animals. That spells serious trouble.

May 25, 2007

New Elephant Arrives At Tennessee Sanctuary

Enjoy this latest news from the excellent people at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. Dulary, an Asian elephant caged in a quarter-acre yard at the Philadelphia Zoo for 43 of her 43.5 years, has been given a second life on 2,700 acres in Hohenwald. She joins a small herd of other Asian elephants offered retirement from circuses, roadside zoos, and just plain abuse—many of them crippled or ill. The Sanctuary is home to a small herd of African elephants, as well. Dulary has taken to a natural elephant lifestyle like, well, an elephant.

May 5th, 2007: This was a good day for a grand adventure, and after only three full days of Sanctuary life Dulary was ready for more exploring. Her curiosity got the best of her as caregivers and dogs headed out towards the lake. Dulary dusted, grazed and played in a mud puddle as she made her way down the road that leads to the lake. She hesitated for a moment (but only a moment) as she passed through the open gate. She may have wondered why these people keep leaving all the gates open, but she did not waste any time; instead, she walked through the open gate and right up the hill. She loves the new grasses growing alongside the road and the mud was good enough to cover her body with, completely. When she reached the top of the hill the vegetation was more than she could resist, and that is where she stayed all afternoon and into the night.

Check out this video made in memory of Jenny, who arrived, crippled, at the sanctuary in 1996, whereupon her life improved exponentially--though no one could predict her incredible good fortune when Shirley arrived three years later. The two had lived in a circus together more than 20 years earlier, where they’d been as close as mother and daughter. Once reunited at the Sanctuary, they were inseparable for the next 7 years, until Jenny’s death last October.

This place reconfirms my belief that elephants are simply incredible, and that people are capable of incredible good. --JULIA WHITTY

May 24, 2007

Gold Rush To The Deep Seafloor

Deep-Sea News' 18-month-old reports on the rush to mine the deep oceans is finally making the news. Well, the science news, at least.

Hydrothermal vents have given us many things…. But the fact that seafloor massive sulfides can precipitate a king's ransom in gold, silver, copper, and zinc was an unexpected boost to the cauldron-like charisma of hydrothermal vent ecosystems. Deep Sea News first started reporting on Vancouver based company Nautilus Minerals' intention to mine extinct hydrothermal vents in Papua New Guinea back in November of 2005. Big-time scientific weeklies Science and Nature finally caught up to our meticulous coverage of vent mining just this week, reporting on the new gold rush to the deep seafloor.

Deep-Sea News has at least four stories on hydrothermal vent mining. MoJo's current cover story Gone describes something of the wonders far below. --JULIA WHITTY

One In Six European Mammals Threatened With Extinction

The first assessment of European mammals finds nearly one in six mammal species threatened with extinction. According to the World Conservation Union, 27% of all mammals have declining populations. Only 8% are increasing, including the European bison, thanks to successful conservation measures. Europe is now home to the world’s most threatened cat species, the Iberian Lynx, and the world’s most threatened seal, the Mediterranean Monk Seal, both classified as critically endangered. --JULIA WHITTY

Global Warming's Effect on Whales And Dolphins

Whales, dolphins and porpoises are facing increasing threats from climate change. A report published by the World Wildlife Fund and the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, released in advance of the 59th meeting of the International Whaling Commission, finds many populations to be vulnerable to global warming. Cetaceans that rely on polar waters-–belugas, narwhals, and bowhead whales-–are likely to be dramatically affected by the reduction of sea ice. Less sea ice will allow more commercial shipping, oil, gas and mining exploration and development, and military activities in previously untouched areas.

Other impacts of global warming include less habitat for river dolphins, the acidification of the oceans as they absorb CO2, more cetacean disease epidemics, and lower reproductive success and survival rates. Climate change could also be the nail in the coffin for the last 300 or so endangered North Atlantic right whales. The survival of their calves has been directly related to the effects of climate variability on prey abundance.

Check out why we need all these species. --JULIA WHITTY

Alarming Acceleration In CO2 Emissions Worldwide

Worldwide CO2 emissions have increased at more than three times the rate of the 1990s. Between 2000 and 2004, the rate increased from 1.1 % per year to 3.1% per year—as alluded to in an earlier post. The Carnegie Institution reports that not only is no region is decarbonising its energy supply, but a long-term trend toward greater energy efficiency and reduced carbon intensities is being reversed.

"Despite the scientific consensus that carbon emissions are affecting the world's climate, we are not seeing evidence of progress in managing those emissions in either the developed or developing countries. In many parts of the world, we are going backwards, " remarked co-author of the study Chris Field, director of the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology. The research also shows that the actual global emissions since 2000 grew faster than the highest of the scenarios developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The acceleration is greatest in the exploding economies of developing regions, particularly China.

Of course, by refusing to tackle our own emissions (the largest in the world), we in the U.S. paralyze whatever superpower muscle might be brought to bear on the issue worldwide. Another casualty of six years in the Bush leagues. --JULIA WHITTY

May 23, 2007

Hydrogen Breakthrough Could Open the Road to Carbon-Free Cars

Here's good news on the hydrogen storage front. UK scientists have developed a compound of the element lithium that may make it practical for hydrogen fuel cell cars to drive more than 300 miles before refuelling. Fuel cells produce carbon-free electricity by harnessing electrochemical reactions between hydrogen and oxygen. Today's prototype HFC cars have a range of only 200 miles, and a 300-mile range would require storage the size of a double-decker bus.

But the UK research has focused on a different approach enabling hydrogen to be stored at a much higher density within acceptable weight limits. The option involves a well-established process called 'chemisorption', in which atoms of a gas are absorbed into the crystal structure of a solid-state material and then released when needed. This could tip the balance in favor of a truly marketable technology.

Fuel-cell technology could assist the emergence of a hydrogen economy rather than a carbon economy. A 2004 report concluded that hydrogen vehicles alone would enable the UK to meet its Kyoto targets for CO2 reductions.

Let’s hope this technology gets on the road fast. --JULIA WHITTY

Predicting Catastrophe

What makes a tipping point finally tip? New research reveals a fascinating mechanism. Complex systems, like the earth’s climate, coral reefs, oceans, and social-economic systems, often react in a surprising way to change. When conditions change gradually, the system may respond little until a critical tipping point is reached, after which the system may collapse completely. After collapse, it’s nearly impossible to restore the original state of the system. Yet managers have had difficulty predicting catastrophic transition without a deep knowledge of the underlying mechanisms.

But now, Egbert van Nes and Marten Scheffer have analyzed models concluded there's a simpler way to predict a catastrophic transition. Their work, in the June issue of The American Naturalist, shows that after small disturbances the system recovers much more slowly if a collapse is near. They argue that this slower recovery serves as an early warning signal for upcoming shifts. In practice, the recovery rate can be determined from small experiments, or by analyzing the natural variations in a time series.

So, will we do it? It’s kind of like taking a DNA test to see if you’re going to inherit a fatal disease or not. Few at risk do. --JULIA WHITTY

May 22, 2007

Finally, New York City Greens Its Taxicabs

Guess how many miles per gallon those yellow Crown Victorias get? About 10 to 15 mpg. That's on par if not worse than an SUV. But things are changing. Bloomberg proposed this morning to require all new vehicles entering the fleet to get at least 25 mpg, then 30 mpg the year after. One complaint: it won't take effect for another year and a half, not until October 2008. Still, it's a great, long-awaited move.

CO2 Emissions Exceed "Worst-Case Scenario"

Recent carbon dioxide emissions exceed the "worst-case scenario" scientists predicted in the IPCC report in 2001. Meanwhile, the Antarctic Ocean is absorbing less carbon dioxide. And the Antarctic is thawing.

May 21, 2007

Child Bipolar Diagnoses Have Quintupled in a Decade

A four-year-old died of prescription overdose