Earth Hour was initiated in 2007, in Sydney, Australia, with 2.2 million homes and businesses turning their lights off for one hour. Considering that March 28, 2009 marked only the third Earth Hour celebration, and the 2nd global Earth Hour event, the numbers are staggering. Participation soared, from 400 cities in 2008 to 4,085 registered [...]
In a nationally televised address to the American public last month, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal ridiculed a $140 million line item in the US economic stimulus package for “something called ‘volcano monitoring.’ Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, D.C.,” said Jindal.
One could argue whether the [...]
Chances are, you’ve heard about carbon capture and storage (or sequestration) as one approach to reducing humans’ contribution to global climate change.
The idea seems simple enough: capture carbon dioxide from large-scale, greenhouse gas emitters such as coal-fired power plants, and store it in porous rock formations underground.
But is carbon capture and storage really feasible on [...]
Earth Hour 2009: Saturday, March 31
8:30-9:30 p.m. Local Time
The achievement of Earth Hour 2009 will not be the energy saved globally in an hour, but rather the visual demonstration of a worldwide mandate to address climate change. This Saturday, for the first time in history, people worldwide have the opportunity to vote with their light [...]
New technologies will permit rapid decarbonization of the world energy economy in the next two decades, according to a new report from the Worldwatch Institute. These new energy sources will make it possible to retire hundreds of coal-fired power plants that now provide 40 percent of the world’s power by 2030, eliminating up to one-third [...]
With burgeoning interest in local food and the revival of Victory Gardens, from your house to the White House, I found this article, from Kitchen Gardeners International, supportive of our individual efforts to reconnect with the food chain.
Consumers are taking action in record numbers, inspired by both health and the recession. According to the [...]
Crops in Space? Absolutely… especially if people are to travel for months and years to other worlds and systems. It would be impossible, for instance, to send along enough food and water for a team of space explorers on a mission to Mars. The reality is food and water production over a full life cycle [...]
An undersea volcano approximately 7 miles southwest of the main island of Tongatapu erupted this week in a spectacular display, spewing smoke, steam and ash thousands of feet above the surface of the South Pacific ocean.
First signs of the eruption began appearing on Monday after a series of earthquakes were felt in the capital city [...]
International World Water Day has been held annually, on 22 March, since 1993, when the United Nations General Assembly designated IWWD as a vehicle for focusing attention on the significance of freshwater and promoting the equitable and sustainable management of freshwater resources, globally. Freshwater scarcity is one of today’s most urgent environmental challenges. The observance [...]
We never really think about Earth as having weight because in space, it is actually weightless. Objects on Earth have weight and even mountains and oceans have weight.
So what does Earth weigh? Earth’s weight is 5.972 sextillion (1,000 trillion) metric tons, and it is actually gaining weight. That’s 5,972,000,000,000,000, 000,000 tons and gaining! Scientists refer [...]
The creation of millions of jobs are a likely result of the impact of the emerging global ”green economy” as the work force deals with the impacts of climate change says the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
In its recent report titled Green Jobs: Towards Decent work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World, UNEP says changing patterns of employment and [...]
The potential human costs of climate change have been underestimated, according to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) 2007-2008 Human Development Report. Calling global climate change the defining development challenge of the 21st century, UNDP stresses that it could leave hundreds of millions of the poorest citizens in the poorest countries malnourished and lacking adequate supplies of safe [...]
