Food Ark: Will Seed Banks Save Our Sources of Food?
“Experts estimate that we have lost more than half of the world’s food varieties over the past century”. Charles Siebert writes in National Geographic:
Svalbard Vault Mountain (Cutaway). Illustration: Global Crop Diversity Trust
A crisis is looming: To feed our growing population, we’ll need to double food production. Yet crop yields aren’t increasing fast enough, and climate change and new diseases threaten the limited varieties we’ve come to depend on for food. Luckily we still have the seeds and breeds to ensure our future food supply — but we must take steps to save them.
Six miles outside the town of Decorah, Iowa, an 890-acre stretch of rolling fields and woods called Heritage Farm is letting its crops go to seed. It seems counterintuitive, but then everything about this farm stands in stark contrast to the surrounding acres of neatly rowed corn and soybean fields that typify modern agriculture. Heritage Farm is devoted…
New Little Ice Age In Store Next Decade?
The Telegraph says we may enter a short mini-Ice Age in the next decade due to low solar activity. Consider it Mother Nature giving us a temporary reprieve from global warming so that we have time to set things right:
Sunspot activity, which follows an 11-year cycle, is due to peak in 2013 after which it will start to wane slightly. But astronomers think the next upswing will be less intensive than normal, or could fail to happen at all. That could affect weather on Earth because low solar activity has been linked to low global temperatures in the past.
Three studies, presented at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s solar physics division, all point towards declining sunspot activity into the next decade.
Between 1645 and 1715 almost no sunspots were observed, a solar period which came to be called the Maunder Minimum. During those decades Europe suffered frequent unusually harsh winters, and…
Australia’s ‘Kill A Camel’ To Cut Pollution Concept
Photo: Dan Searle (CC)
How can we curb the emission of greenhouse gases? Get rid of a bunch of camels, apparently. Via Physorg:
Australia is considering awarding carbon credits for killing feral camels as a way to tackle climate change.
The suggestion is included in Canberra’s “Carbon Farming Initiative”, a consultation paper by the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, seen Thursday.
Adelaide-based Northwest Carbon, a commercial company, proposed culling some 1.2 million wild camels that roam the Outback, the legacy of herds introduced to help early settlers in the 19th century.
Considered a pest due to the damage they do to vegetation, a camel produces, on average, a methane equivalent to one tonne of carbon dioxide a year, making them collectively one of Australia’s major emitters of greenhouse gases.
In its plan, Northwest said it would shoot them from helicopters or muster them and send them to an abattoir for either human or pet…
Genetically Induced Drought-Resistant Corn Could Feed Our Future
Photo: JLantzy
Could genetic modification be the only way to save our food during the drought-full future? The Scientific American reports:
Climate change has yet to diminish crop yields in the U.S. corn belt but scientists expect drought to become more common due to global warming in coming years. That could impact everything from the price of food to the price of fuel planet-wide. As a result, for the last several years agribusiness giants like Monsanto, Pioneer and Syngenta have been pursuing genetic modification to enable the corn plant to thrive even without enough rain. And now the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is considering approving a new corn hybrid genetically engineered to thrive on less water—the first time such a corn strain would be available.
“Working on something like drought is more complex than introducing a trait like insect resistance,” says plant breeder Bob Reiter, vice president of biotechnology at Monsanto, the company seeking approval…
Wikileaks Cables Show Race To Carve Up Arctic
BBC News reports:
Secret US embassy cables released by Wikileaks show nations are racing to “carve up” Arctic resources — oil, gas and even rubies — as the ice retreats.
They suggest that Arctic states, including the US and Russia, are all pushing to stake a claim.
The opportunity to exploit resources has come because of a dramatic fall in the amount of ice in the Arctic.
The US Geological Survey estimates oil reserves off Greenland are as big as those in the North Sea.
The cables were released by the Wikileaks whistleblower website as foreign ministers from the eight Arctic Council member states – Russia, the United States, Canada, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Sweden and Iceland – met in Nuuk, Greenland on Thursday to sign a treaty on international search-and-rescue in the Arctic and discuss the region’s future challenges.
The cables claim the Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller joked with the Americans saying “if you stay…
The Vatican Takes on Climate Change
Eric Bangeman writes on ars technica:
The Vatican Pontifical Academy of Sciences has just released a strongly worded report (PDF) on global climate change demanding in the strongest possible language that humans act decisively to avert a coming crisis. “We call on all people and nations to recognize the serious and potentially reversible impacts of global warming caused by the anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants,” says the report. “If we want justice and peace, we must protect the habitat that sustains us.”
The report was not authored by the Pontifical Academy itself; rather, the Vatican convened a group of scientists with relevant experience, along with a few Nobel Prize winners. The group’s focus was on increasing evidence of glacier retreat, and the report ended up focused on its causes. The group’s co-chair, Nobel Laureate Paul Crutzen, used a somewhat controversial name for the “man-made” geologic era in which we are now living: the “Anthropocene.”
Charles Manson Breaks Silence: Discussing President Obama, Global Warming And His Followers
After twenty years of silence Charles Manson speaks … about the environment. Discussing topics such as President Obama and Wall Street, he emphasizes his concerns for global warming. Manson has gathered yet another group of followers, this time agreeing with his thoughts towards saving the environment, our ‘one world.’ ABC News reports:
Scientists Find First Evidence Climate Affects Tectonic Plate Movement
Via Discover:
Geologists have known for years that tectonic plates affect climate patterns. Now they say that the opposite is also true, finding that intensifying climate events can move tectonic plates. Using models based on known monsoonal and plate movement patterns, geologists say that the Indian Plate has accelerated by about 20% over the past 10 million years. “The significance of this finding lies in recognising for the first time that long-term climate changes have the potential to act as a force and influence the motion of tectonic plates,” Australian National University researcher Giampiero Iaffaldano told COSMOS.
The researchers plugged information from research on monsoonal patterns and the Indian Plate’s movement into a model, which indicated that the monsoonal erosion that has battered the eastern Himalaya Mountains for the past 10 million years erodes enough material to account for the plate’s counter-clockwise rotation. By gradually shaving off rocks from the eastern flank and…
Earth Getting Mysteriously Windier
Mason Inman writes on National Geographic:
The world has gotten stormier over the past two decades — and the reason is a mystery, a new study says.
In the past 20 years, winds have picked up around 5 percent on average.
Extremely strong winds caused by storms have increased even faster, jumping 10 percent over 20 years, according to the new analysis of global satellite data.
The study, the first to look at wind speeds across such a large swath of the planet, bolsters some earlier findings, according to study leader Ian Young, of the Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia.
“Some regional studies had found similar results, so we suspected there may be an increasing trend,” Young said.
As Fish Die Off, Jellyfish To Dominate Earth’s Oceans
Around the globe, fish populations are declining while the number of jellyfish is exploding. Climate change may be “turning back the clock to the Precambrian world, more than 550 million years ago, when the ancestors of jellyfish ruled the seas,” writes Yale Environment 360. Bow down to our future gelatinous overlords:
The world’s oceans have been experiencing enormous blooms of jellyfish, apparently caused by overfishing, declining water quality, and rising sea temperatures. Now, scientists are trying to determine if these outbreaks could represent a “new normal” in which jellyfish increasingly supplant fish.
The Nomura’s jellyfish is a monster to be reckoned with. It’s the size of a refrigerator and can exceed 450 pounds. For decades the hulking medusa was rarely encountered in its stomping grounds, the Sea of Japan.
Then something changed. Since 2002, the population has exploded six times. In 2005, a particularly bad year, the Sea of Japan brimmed with as…
UN Warns Of Cancer From Climate Change
Source: Global Warming Art Project (CC)
Scaremongering to create a worldwide carbon tax? Or is this a reality? From the Daily Mail:
Melting glaciers and ice sheets are releasing cancer-causing pollutants into the air and oceans, scientists say. The long-lasting chemicals get into the food chain and build up in people’s bodies – triggering tumours, heart disease and infertility.
The warning comes in a new international study into the links between climate change and a class of man-made toxins called persistent organic pollutants. The study – due to be published next month – says rising temperatures and more extreme weather are increasing human exposure to pollutants around the world, including in Britain.
Scientists are concerned about Persistent Organic Pollutants, or POPs, because they last decades in the environment and accumulate in body tissue. They include pesticides such as DDT and chemicals called PCBs used in electrical goods.
Donald Cooper, of the United Nations Environment Programme…
The Possibility of Hope
A great extra from the fantastic movie Children of Men. Modern philosophers, political scientists, and climate scientists weigh-in on the state of the Earth, global politics, militarism, mass-migration, global warming, and the future of humanity.
(For the disinfo regular, I’d recommend the watching the movie The Constant Gardener and the documentary Darwin’s Nightmare, but perhaps you already have…)
Congressman Says He Lost Because He Took ‘Satan’s Side’
Rep. Bob Inglis
There’s just nothing you can say that will help me come to grips with a belief in global warning being Satanic. Take it away Congressman (via The Hill):
Rep. Bob Inglis, the defeated South Carolina Republican who is attacking climate skepticism in the GOP ranks, says his belief in global warming put him on “Satan’s side” in some voters’ eyes.
The outgoing lawmaker — who lost his GOP primary in a challenge from the right — told ClimateWire that his views damaged him politically in his district, which is in the northwest part of his state.
Inglis said several of his positions led to his primary defeat at the hands Rep.-elect Trey Gowdy, who went on to win the general election. But his belief in global warming had the most effect, he said.
“The most enduring heresy was just saying that climate change was real,” Inglis said in the ClimateWire account. “That was…
Scientists Vow To Fight Back Against Climate Skeptics
Neela Banerjee of the Tribune Washington Bureau reports that The American Geophysical Union plans to announce that 700 researchers have agreed to speak out on the issue. Other scientists plan a pushback against congressional conservatives who have vowed to kill regulations on greenhouse gas emissions. Via the Los Angeles Times:
Faced with rising political attacks, hundreds of climate scientists are joining a broad campaign to push back against congressional conservatives who have threatened prominent researchers with investigations and vowed to kill regulations to rein in man-made greenhouse gas emissions.
The still-evolving efforts reveal a shift among climate scientists, many of whom have traditionally stayed out of politics and avoided the news media. Many now say they are willing to go toe-to-toe with their critics, some of whom gained new power after the Republicans won control of the House in Tuesday’s election.
On Monday, the American Geophysical Union, the country’s largest association of climate…
Yale University Poll Shows Americans Are Confused On Climate Change
Click image to download PDF of full report
I’m not sure which camp the results of this poll by Yale University helps the most, the climate change believers or their sworn enemies, the “deniers:”
Americans’ Knowledge of Climate Change reports results from a national study of what Americans understand about how the climate system works, and the causes, impacts, and potential solutions to global warming. Among other findings, the study identifies a number of important gaps in public knowledge and common misconceptions about climate change.
Overall, we found that 63 percent of Americans believe that global warming is happening, but many do not understand why… These misconceptions lead some people to doubt that global warming is happening or that human activities are a major contributor, to misunderstand the causes and therefore the solutions, and to be unaware of the risks. Thus many Americans lack some of the knowledge needed for informed decision-making in a democratic…
Bad News for Super-Villains: Blotting Out The Sun May Soon Be Banned
Mr. Burns: Smithers, have The Rolling Stones killed.
Smithers: But sir, the UN is responsible…
Burns: Do as I say!
Bad news for super-villains everywhere. Tim Wall writes in Discovery News:
Blotting out the sun has been the dream of many arch-villains, including The Simpson’s Mr. Burns. Their schemes may soon be foiled by the United Nations’ Convention on Biological Diversity.
Super villains aren’t the only ones who want to shade the Earth from the sun. Blocking some of the sun’s rays could slow climate change by reducing the amount of sunlight warming the Earth, say some researchers, such as Roger Angel of the University of Arizona.
The Convention may consider banning or limiting research into space sunshades. Some question their wisdom. A space sunshade would have a rapid effect on global warming and provide time to develop more permanent measures, they say. The technique has already received serious attention from NASA and other organizations.
But others, such as the…
Physics Professor: ‘Global Warming is the Greatest and Most Successful Pseudoscientific Fraud…’
The professor’s letter of resignation speaks for itself and deserves to be reproduced in full, so here it is:
From: Hal Lewis, University of California, Santa Barbara
To: Curtis G. Callan, Jr., Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society
6 October 2010
Dear Curt:
When I first joined the American Physical Society sixty-seven years ago it was much smaller, much gentler, and as yet uncorrupted by the money flood (a threat against which Dwight Eisenhower warned a half-century ago). Indeed, the choice of physics as a profession was then a guarantor of a life of poverty and abstinence—it was World War II that changed all that. The prospect of worldly gain drove few physicists. As recently as thirty-five years ago, when I chaired the first APS study of a contentious social/scientific issue, The Reactor Safety Study, though there were zealots aplenty on the outside there was no hint of inordinate pressure on us as physicists.…
10:10 Organization Dumped By Sponsors Over ‘Splattergate’
A few days ago the activist climate change organization 10:10 caused a worldwide scandal over their promo video that blows up schoolchildren and others who decline to subscribe to their carbon emission reduction pledge.
Now they’re paying the price, as PrisonPlanet’s Paul Joseph Watson reports that Sony and other former supporters of 10:10 are fleeing in droves:
As a result of the huge backlash in response to the shocking 10:10 Global climate change infomercial, in which children are liquidated for not expressing support for reducing carbon emissions, Sony has been forced to disassociate itself from the eco-fascist group behind the video.
In an email, Sony Europe Director of Corporate Communications Nick Sharples has “taken the decision to disassociate ourselves from 10:10 at this time.”
However, Sony still remains committed to “its objective to reduce carbon emissions,” indicating that the disgraceful PSA has done nothing to shift Sony’s support for the global warming scam.
Charles Manson: Global Warming Prophet
Paul Joseph Watson says that eco-nut James Jay Lee, along with many prominent environmentalists and academics, share their eugenicist belief system with the man who many consider to be evil incarnate, at Prison Planet:
Charles Manson, the man who masterminded the brutal murders of nine people in the summer of 1969 in an effort to spark a race war in America, has adopted a new cause from his prison cell in California – he is a prophet for the global warming movement – sharing common ground with top academics, environmentalists and even the White House science czar in calling for large numbers of human beings to be exterminated in the name of saving the Earth.
A study of Manson’s belief system is an alarming exercise in understanding the roots of the modern day eugenicist movement, which is propagated via the notion that overpopulation is killing the planet and causing global warming.
Climate Change Lies Exposed
It’s certainly quite a sea change in media coverage of climate change issues in the UK! From the Daily Express:
The world’s leading climate change body has been accused of losing credibility after a damning report into its research practices.
A high-level inquiry into the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found there was “little evidence” for its claims about global warming.
It also said the panel had emphasised the negative impacts of climate change and made “substantive findings” based on little proof.
The review by the InterAcademy Council (IAC) was launched after the IPCC’s hugely embarrassing 2007 benchmark climate change report, which contained exaggerated and false claims that Himalayan glaciers could melt by 2035.
The panel was forced to admit its key claim in support of global warming was lifted from a 1999 magazine article. The report was based on an interview with a little-known Indian scientist who has since said his views were “speculation”…
