Category Archives: Environment

Are We at Risk of Collapse?

This blog is not for the fainthearted, but even I found this item sobering. Mark Thoma at Economist’s View featured an interview with Jared Diamond, author of Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Note that one commentator at Thoma’s site disputed Diamond’s argument that the genocide in Rwanda was caused by competition for […]

BBC: People Willing to Sacrifice to Combat Global Warming

The BBC conducted a large-scale survey of 22,000 people in 21 countries and found widespread support for curtailing lifestyle in to fight global warming. Note that this survey was conducted before the news of the extraordinary Arctic summer ice melt, which could have shifted opinion further in the direction of taking action. Of course, the […]

China’s Dependence on Coal

A good article from the Associated Press, “World’s Coal Dependency Hits Environment,” doesn’t appear, at least according to Google News, to have been picked up elsewhere, which is a shame. While the title refers to “world’s,” the story is largely about China. We’ve discussed the environmental damage done by coal-fired electrical plants, yet China and […]

Martin Wolf is Down on Biofuels

Martin Wolf, the Financial Times’ highly regarded economics editor, has an usually blunt article today, “Biofuels: a tale of special interests and subsidies.” While the main target is the way special interests are turning biofuels into yet another agricultural pork barrel, he makes a number of important observations: biofuels are only marginally cleaner than conventional […]

A Wee Bit of Good Environmental News

This blog generally features less than cheery news on the environment/species loss/global warming front, mainly because there isn’t a hell of a lot positive to report. So we wanted to pass along a wee positive development about wee creatures, namely frogs. As readers may know, frog populations have been falling, and one of the culprits […]

Rising Ozone Levels to Reduce Agricultural Productivity by 40%

Ozone is getting increasing attention as a greenhouse gas, and the findings are not pretty. We reported earlier on research that found that ozone interferes with plant photosynthesis, which both reduces its effectiveness as a carbon sink and reduces plant productivity. A new MIT study (hat tip Mark Thoma) reports that rising ozone levels are […]

One Third of Primates at Risk of Extinction

A report by the World Conservation Society reports that one third of the world’s primates are under threat of extinction due to habitat loss and being hunted for food and use in medicines. Twenty-five species are particularly imperiled. As the BBC tells us: The report focuses on the fate of the world’s 25 most endangered […]

CO2 Levels Rising Faster Than Forecast

The journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has published an article that finds that atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are rising faster than projected. We reported recently on the fact that oceans are becoming less effective as a carbon sink, an idea independently confirmed by Dr. Corinne Le Quere, of the University of […]

The Future of Coral Reefs

John Quiggin, Australian economist and popular blogger, participated in the Coral Reef Futures Forum since one of his many roles is to look at the economics of the Great Barrier Reef. In addition to shedding light on the progress and consequences of global warming, Quiggin’s post also provides informative comments on what he calls delusionist […]

Oceans Becoming More Acidic (and Why That’s a Big Deal)

We’ve mentioned before that higher atmospheric CO2 levels make the oceans more acidic. And that in turn is very nasty for shellfish, coral reefs, and the foundation of the ocean food supply, plankton. As this article in Science Daily reports, the consequences may be even more serious than those of global warming: The world’s oceans […]

Clive Crook on America’s Sham Carbon Emission Legislation

Faithful readers, I hope you will bear with me over the next couple of days. I am having weird problems with my mice, and needless to say, the lack of a properly functioning mouse is a big obstacle to efficient computer use. The result will likely be fewer posts and/or fewer links in posts. I […]

British Scientists Push Idea of Ocean Burial of CO2

Today, the BBC and the Telegraph, among others, discussed the proposal of James Lovelock of Oxford and Chris Rapley, former head of the British Antarctic Survey, to reduce CO2 levels by pumping it into the deep ocean. Note that this is a type of carbon sequestration. Lovelock and Rapley believe this action is necessary because […]

Wal-Mart as Carbon Enforcer?

The Financial Times, in “Wal-Mart seeks emissions data,” reports that the Bentonville behemoth is out to make it suppliers greener: Wal-Mart is to ask its suppliers to measure and report their greenhouse gas emissions, in the biggest move to disclose emissions from businesses. Few companies disclose their emissions, making it difficult to judge which are […]