Our Oceans are Under Attack

http://realitieswatch.com/adidas-wants-to-recycle-ocean-plastic-to-use-for-its-products/

Ideas like this could help clean up our oceans!

Recently shoe and clothing manufacturer Adidas announced that they will be converting ocean plastic into new shoes and possibly even articles of clothing.The effort is a part of a new partnership with “Parley for the Oceans”, a group of activists, artists and thinkers who come together to raise awareness about oceanic pollution.“The conservation of the oceans is a cause that is close to my heart and those of many employees at the Adidas Group. By partnering with Parley for the Oceans we are contributing to a great environmental cause. We co-create fabrics made from ocean plastic waste which we will integrate into our product,” Eric Liedtke, Adidas Group executive board member told Ecowatch.The company also announced that they will voluntarily stop using plastic bags in all of its stores.“Our oceans are about to collapse and there is not much time left to turn it around. Nobody can solve this alone. Everyone has to be part of the solution. And collaboration is the magic formula. We are extremely excited about this partnership. There is no other brand that carries the culture of collaboration in the DNA like Adidas. Together, we will not only focus on creating the next generation of design concepts, technologies, materials and products. We will also engage consumers, athletes, artists, designers, actors, musicians, scientists and environmentalists to raise their voice and contribute their skills for the ocean cause,” Cyrill Gutsch of Parley for the Oceans said.

 

A third of Catholics would go green if Pope Francis makes statement on climate change

http://www.independent.co.uk/enviro...kes-statement-on-climate-change-10222800.html

A third of Catholics say they will make their lifestyle greener if Pope Francis makes an official statement on climate change, ahead of a significant publication from the Vatican on the environment.

A poll of 1,049 Catholics in England and Wales found more than seven out 10 (72 per cent) were concerned that the world’s poorest people were being hit by climate change and more than three-quarters (76 per cent) said they felt a moral obligation to help them.

Four-fifths (80 per cent) of those quizzed in the YouGov survey for aid agency Cafod said that as Catholics they felt a duty to care for God’s creation, the Earth.

The survey also revealed that 33 per cent of Catholics are likely to change their lifestyle if Pope Francis makes an official statement on climate change, for example by trying to drive less or recycle more.

 

Brazil struggles with drought and pollution as Olympics loom large

http://www.theguardian.com/sustaina...ic-games-rio-de-janiero-rio-20-climate-change

Pollution in Guanabara Bay, where Olympic sailing and windsurfing contests are scheduled to be held, is so bad that competitors have described it as an ‘open sewer’

Amid what is normally considered the rainy season, Brazil, the home of the Amazon River, is suffering from a historic, punishing drought.

In a country accustomed to ample water supplies, neighbors are turning against neighbors and hoarding water as taps run dry while businesses close and protesters take to the streets. Some have even speculated that São Paulo, one of the world’s largest cities, is failing.

The costs of a drought are many – water rationing, fines for consumption and constraints on agriculture and industrial production. But for Brazil, a water shortage also leads to another problem: more than 75% of Brazil’s power comes from hydroelectric sources, making it second only to China in reliance on hydroelectric power.

The water crisis is pushing Brazil to take extreme measures to save water even as low water levels are decimating its hydropower supplies, leading to rolling power cuts across the country.

With its rainforest, favelas and megacities, Brazil is a huge piece of the puzzle for many of the world’s biggest sustainability goals, and the country has loomed large in environmental discussions since it held the Rio+20 climate talks in 2012.

Add to these the importance of caring for the Amazon rainforest – the “lungs of the planet”, which stores more carbon dioxide than anywhere else on Earth – and it becomes clear why social and environmental progress in Brazil is at least as important as its economic growth.

Deforestation in the Amazon Basin has long been a thorn in Brazil’s side. Not only do numerous human rights and indigenous peoples’ rights threats arise from deforestation, but researchers recently directly connected Amazonian deforestation to the horrific drought in southern Brazil.

 

A mile deep, ocean fish facing health impacts from human pollution

http://phys.org/news/2015-03-mile-deep-ocean-fish-health.html

Deep-water marine fish living on the continental slopes at depths from 2,000 feet to one mile have liver pathologies, tumors and other health problems that may be linked to human-caused pollution, one of the first studies of its type has found.

 

Is Solving Climate Change as Simple as Sucking Carbon Out of the Air?

http://www.alternet.org/environment/solving-climate-change-simple-sucking-carbon-out-air

One company attempts to tap into the potentially $1 trillion carbon marketplace.

It sounds almost too obvious. But we may be able to stave off some of the major effects of catastrophic climate change simply by sucking out of the air the vast amounts of carbon dioxide we’ve been spewing for decades. It’s not a new idea, but it’s one that has never been economical. Until now, perhaps.

Graciela Chichilnisky believes her company has developed a groundbreaking technology not just to capture CO2, but to tap a trillion-dollar market and sell it. Chichilnisky is the CEO and co-founder of Global Thermostat, which she describes as “a company that can be profitable and can simultaneously resolve the climate issue and the problem of global poverty.” Fast Company recently named it one of the top 10 most innovative energy companies in the world.

The company hopes to achieve its mission by leveraging new technology with market-based thinking. The idea is pretty straightforward: Remove CO2, one of the biggest contributors to climate change, from the air and then sell it to companies that use CO2 in their products or operations. Take a liability and make it an asset.

Technology to capture CO2 is not new. The most talked about application, carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology, often pairs with fossil-fuel power plants, including those using coal. But it has proved difficult to scale and some critics have questioned whether it is even effective in reducing climate change if it continues to prop up one of the most polluting industries in the world.

Chichilnisky says they hope to tap the $1 trillion market for CO2. And right now is a particularly exciting time for Global Thermostat. After years of running two pilot projects, the technology is ready to go commercial. They have investment from NRG and partnerships with Corning and Linde. By next year, she says, they should have two plants operational and another two in 2017.

 

Arctic ice melting faster and earlier as scientists demand action

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/05/arctic-ice-retreat-scientists-climate-change

Arctic returns to warm period with trend over the decades continuing to show temperatures getting hotter and ice melting faster, scientists say

There was less ice in the Arctic this winter than in any other winter during the satellite era, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists said on Tuesday.

The announcement was consistent with previous predictions that the Arctic would have entirely ice-free summers by 2040, they said in a briefing to the media on the state of climate trends in the north pole.

After undergoing a period of colder temperatures and slower ice retreat between 2007 and 2012, the Arctic is returning to a warm period with the overall trend over the decades continuing to show temperatures getting hotter and ice melting faster.

Ed Farley, a scientist with NOAA’s Alaska fisheries science center, said that studies over the last 15 years showed that ice melting faster year-on-year led to a drastic loss in the fat contained in zooplankton – a fish food crucial for the entire area’s ecosystem.

In the Arctic, fat content – the higher the better – contained in zooplankton has serious, knock-on effects that determine living creatures’ ability to make it through the winter.

Zooplankton feeds the area’s fish, which in turn feed the area’s seals, which in turn feed the area’s polar bears. Eating high-fat foods is crucial forthose species to allow them to fatten up and survive harsh winter months.

Changing temperatures in the sea may also severely affect access to high-fat foods in the Arctic’s ecosystem, Farley said.

The Arctic cod, which outweighs its Arctic fish brother the Saffron cod in fat content by 2.7 times, thrives in a sea that is 7C, gets smaller past such a temperature, and risks not surviving at all beyond 10C.

With sea temperatures set to be between 10 and 13C by the end of this century, the Arctic cod might not make it – at all. And while the saffron cod, which likes warmer seas, would survive this temperature change, seals would have to eat saffron cod at 2.7 times the rate they eat the Arctic cod to get the same amount of fat for the winter – a tough challenge, to say the least.

No ice also means oil and gas exploration teams will have a much easier time, both in terms of access and period spent exploring, Farley said.

But for people – as well as animals – on the ground, the potential effects are troubling. The effect of ships moving through the northern area of the globe at a much greater rate will be undoubtedly disruptive for sea life.

There is currently no infrastructure in place to handle accidents along shipping routes, Farley said, including oil spills.

 

http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2015/05/carbon-dioxide-global-concentrations

The monthly global average concentration of carbon dioxide just broke 400 parts per million for the first time since record-keeping of greenhouse gas levels began.

And so we're now in the land of tipping points. We know that we've passed some of them—Arctic sea ice is melting, and so is the permafrost that guards those carbon stores. But the logic of Hansen's paper was clear. Above 350, we are at constant risk of crossing other, even worse, thresholds, the ones that govern the reliability of monsoons, the availability of water from alpine glaciers, the acidification of the ocean, and, perhaps most spectacularly, the very level of the seas.

 

Are You Ready for the Biggest Environmental Catastrophe of Our Lifetime?

http://www.alternet.org/environment/are-you-ready-biggest-environmental-catastrophe-our-lifetime

I am a surfer and have been since 13 years of age. Being a surfer, you develop an innate sense of weather patterns and their impact on the sea. Cold fronts, warm fronts, low pressure systems, hurricanes, nor'easters, etc. The weather and how nature reacts to changing air patterns become part of your make-up as you seek out the waves. It's been a lifetime of learning and watching nature do its thing. I am a waterman with a love of science and data. Enter Antarctica.

Antarctica has been on my mind thanks to the folks at HBO's VICE ("The Definitive Guide to Enlightened Information" as they call themselves). Big chunks of that continent are falling into the sea. And the team at VICE have done a stellar job reporting the facts. The deniers can blow all the smoke they want, but as you watch this spectacle unfold, history, pictures, science, data and nature do not lie.

Antarctica is a beautiful and majestic continent. There is a purity about this land mass that you don't get anywhere else on the planet. It holds 90% of the world's ice and 70% of the world's fresh water. Antarctica is 1.5 times the land mass of the continental United States.

The entire continent is at risk, but the big changes that are taking place now are in West Antarctica (WA). The disruption in the ecosystem there is poised for acceleration in the months and years ahead—and it will be rapid. The effects will be felt across the planet. Just ask the folks in Bangladesh now. Theirs is one of the most low-lying countries on Earth.

Millions are currently being displaced from their coastal homes due to perpetual rising waters—a quiet and permanent tsunami taking over their lives; Venice, Italy, now under water 100 days each year; parts of Miami Beach now starting to experience consistent flooding on a regular basis (as a former resident I have seen it first hand); the people of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean quickly losing their small island nation to water. Shanghai, Amsterdam and Bangkok are among hundreds of low-lying cities that will likely start to experience consistent rising waters if they have not already.

We have been watching a version of WA collapse take place in Greenland over the years, and from the data that scientists have been able to pull, we are 60 years ahead of worst-case scenarios for ice loss there. Precedent has been set in Greenland as we are readied for the main catastrophic environmental event of our lifetime now unfolding in Antarctica.

Trust me, I very much want to be wrong on this scenario, but all the signs and science are there in alignment. In WA, adjacent to Pine Island Bay, a portion of the Pine Island Glacier the size of Singapore broke off and tumbled into the bay in 2013. Then in 2014 an American Geophysical Union report took things a few steps further showing that the West Antarctic ice sheet is actually melting away. At some point soon, West Antarctic trouble spots like Pine Island Glacier, Thwaites, Haynes, Pope, Smith and Koehler Glaciers are all going to be at risk to massive melting.

As this trend accelerates, the world as we know it will be re-mapped. A four-foot sea level rise will mean no more Florida Keys and no Miami Beach; the New York City subway system and parts of NYC under water.

The same alarm bells that were rung for Greenland are now being rung for Antarctica. The results will be exponentially worse. We are talking 70 percent of the planet's fresh water. Imagine being in Manhattan watching skyscrapers and apartment buildings collapsing around you every day. This is what scientists are witnessing in WA currently. Nary a word is reported. Hillary at Chipotle wins that prize last week.

 

Researchers measure giant "internal waves" that help regulate climate

http://phys.org/news/2015-05-giant-internal-climate.html#nRlv

Once a day, a wave as tall as the Empire State Building and as much as a hundred miles wide forms in the waters between Taiwan and the Philippines and rolls across the South China Sea – but on the surface, it is hardly noticed.

These daily monstrosities are called "internal waves" because they are beneath the ocean surface and though scientists have known about them for years, they weren't really sure how significant they were because they had never been fully tracked from cradle to grave.

But a new study, published this week in Nature Research Letter, documents what happens to internal waves at the end of their journey and outlines their critical role in global climate. The international research project was funded by the Office of Naval Research and the Taiwan National Science Council.

"Ultimately, they are what mixes heat throughout the ocean," said Jonathan Nash, an Oregon State University oceanographer and co-author on the study. "Without them, the ocean would be a much different place. It would be significantly more stratified – the surface waters would be much warmer and the deep abyss colder.

"It's like stirring cream into your coffee," he added. "Internal waves are the ocean's spoon."

Internal waves help move a tremendous amount of energy from Luzon Strait across the South China Sea, but until this project, scientists didn't know what became of that energy. As it turns out, it's a rather complicated picture. A large fraction of energy dissipates when the wave gets steep and breaks on the deep slopes off China and Vietnam, much like breakers on the beach.

But part of the energy remains, with waves reflecting from the coast and rebounding back into the ocean in different directions.

The internal waves are caused by strong tides flowing over the topography, said Nash, who is in OSU's College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences. The waves originating in Luzon Strait are the largest in the world, based on the region's tidal flow and topography. A key factor is the depth at which the warm- and cold-water layers of the ocean meet – at about 1,000 meters.

The waves can get as high as 500 meters tall and 100-200 kilometers wide before steepening.

"You can actually see them from satellite images,"

 

These Scientists Just Lost Their Lives in the Arctic. They Were Heroes.

http://www.motherjones.com/blue-mar...ientists-just-gave-their-lives-their-research

Early last month, veteran polar explorers and scientists Marc Cornelissen and Philip de Roo set out on skis from Resolute Bay, a remote outpost in the patchwork of islands between Canada and Greenland. Their destination was Bathurst Island, a treacherous 70-mile trek to the northwest across the frozen sea, where they planned to document thinning Arctic sea ice just a few months after NASA reported that the winter ice cover was the lowest on record.

The pair are presumed to have drowned, victims of the same thin ice they had come to study. Cornelissen was 46; de Roo had just turned 30.

The Arctic is warming twice as fast as anywhere else on Earth. We rely on the work of scientists like these to know exactly what is happening there and how it will affect those of us who choose to stay safe in warmer, drier places. Their deaths are a testament to the dedication and fearlessness required to stand on the front lines of climate change.

Rest in peace, guys.

 

Sea Level Rise Maps

http://www.global-warming-forecasts.com/sea-levels-map.php

Potential Global Sea Level Rise chart

 

The Next Decade Will Decide What the World Looks Like for Thousands of Decades to Come

http://www.alternet.org/environment/next-decade-will-decide-what-world-looks-thousands-decades-come

The next 10 years will be decisive when it comes to the planet's future -- what we do (or don't) will play out over geologic time.
It could, if we set our minds to it, be the decade when the planet's use of fossil fuels peaks and then rapidly declines. We've built a movement that, for the moment, is starting to tie down the fossil fuel industry: from the tarsands of Alberta to the (as yet unbuilt) giant new mines of Australia's Galilee Basin, the big players in coal, gas, and oil are bothered and even bewildered by a new strain of activist. They're losing on the image front: when the Rockefeller family, the Church of England, and Prince Charles have begun divesting their fossil fuel stocks, you know the tide has turned.

And with it comes the sudden chance to replace that fossil fuel, fast and relatively easily. Out of nowhere the price of solar panels has fallen like an anvil from a skyscraper, dropping 75 percent in the last six years. Renewable energy is suddenly as cheap or cheaper than the bad stuff, even before you figure in the insane monetary cost of global warming. So in Bangladesh they're solarizing 60,000 huts a month; the whole country may be panelled by 2020.

The next decade is decisive because trajectory counts for so much; if we bend it now, we may slide the car to a halt with just the front tires hanging off the cliff. But if we sail on for a few more years, it's pretty clear we're fast and furiously going airborne -- that's what happens when, say, Arctic permafrost starts to melt in earnest, releasing clouds of methane.

So it's not too much to say that the next decade will decide what the world looks like for thousands of decades to come. We all get front row seats -- but we can all be actors too, if only we'll join the growing movement to do something about it.

 

Playing chicken: Turning pea protein into fake fowl

http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/ind...ng-chicken-turning-pea-protein-into-fake-fowl

It looks like chicken and it tastes like chicken, but the "meat" in this stir-fry comes from Canadian yellow peas – and it could be in supermarket butchery aisles by July.

Auckland businesswoman Shama Lee wants to change the way the world eats protein.

"There are going to be nine billion people on the planet by 2050, and meat consumption is increasing at six percent a year. It's going to move faster as people in developing countries move into the middleclass, because meat really is a middleclass luxury. Where is this growth going to come from? And at what cost?"

Plant protein, says Lee, is the answer.

Sunfed Meats, the company she co-founded in January with her husband Hayden, is partnering with Massey University in a pilot progamme to develop what scientists call a "meat analogue" – fake meat, based on proteins extracted from plants.

The company is on its third iteration of a steamed chicken-like meat and the next step is a commercial-standard trial run at The Foodbowl, the open access test facility operated by NZ Food Innovation Auckland.
Lee is in discussions with an American investor, working on labelling options (she wants to be on the same shelves as regular chicken) and is aiming to be in the local market, at the same price point as the flesh and blood free-range equivalent, this winter.

The cost so far?

"Our life savings have gone into this . . . It's a risky project, as all innovations are – but I couldn't sit back and wait for someone else to do it."

She points to the United States, where Beyond Meat is backed by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, and Europe's Like Meat, a multi-country collaboration with EU Commission funding.

"We can do it better," says Lee. "I seriously believe that."

Think plant protein, think tofu – polarising slabs of bland made from coagulated soy milk.

"It's such a stigma," says Lee. "Blind tests are the only way we can tell people 'no, we don't taste like tofu'."

Lift the lid on a sample pottle of Sunfed chicken and it has the faint smell of toast. But there's no wheat, no gluten, zero cholesterol and less than five percent carbohydrates and fat. It contains between 25-30% protein per 100 grams (regular chicken breast comes in around 18%).

What she's not doing (so far) is having children: "Women entrepreneurs have to think about how much you put into your business. Am I going to have a family? Right now, Sunfed is my baby and, I don't know, I feel like the labour pains are constant!"

Home is a husband, a dog, a cat and two chickens. "I eat cruelty free, which means I do eat clams and oysters and mussels, because they don't really have a complex nervous system and they can't really suffer.

"I exclude dairy and commercial eggs – when the chickens feel like laying eggs, I eat them."

"The meat industry, unfortunately, has a dirty footprint. Because it's so intensive, it's one of the key contributors to climate change . . . pardon the pun, but it's a water hog and a feed hog. The majority of the feed grown in the world is redirected to livestock, as opposed to humans.

"We know meat is linked to heart disease, to certain cancers and it does cause obesity as well. And then zoonotic diseases are a real issue for every human – avian flus, swine flu, mad cow diseases – they're all born in intensive meat production."

Lee says supply chains are compromised, consumers are questioning what animals are fed, how they're treated and how they're slaughtered.

"The question I put to myself was can we make meat directly from plants and skip the animal?"

 

Brazil plans to ‘nationalise’ rainforest in pioneering plan to protect Amazon

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...oneering-plan-to-protect-amazon-10239908.html

The Brazilian rainforest could be effectively nationalised under a draft bill being considered by the country’s MPs.

The proposed legislation would recognise the sovereignty of Brazil over the Amazon’s natural resources and set up a national Amazonian policy council with the aim of enshrining environmental protection and regulating economic activities in the rainforest.

Should the law be passed, companies wanting to operate in the area would require approval from the new state entity in return for shares of the proceeds – in a similar way to that which oil exploration concessions are granted through state-controlled company Petrobras in return for royalties.

The bill succinctly states: “The Federal Government owns all of the natural resources of the Amazon, therein including mines, the forest and watersheds.”

It also set out that the state would have a monopoly over the exploration and mining of any mineral, vegetal, animal or water resource, and the import and export of any resulting products. Under the bill, a national Amazonian policy council would have the responsibility for ensuring the extraction of mineral and vegetal resources was sustainable, and promoting the sustainable exploration of the forest.

But Amazonian politicians have criticised the bill for creating yet more bureaucracy in the protection of the rainforest. Campaigners have also warned that the bill is being considered without consulting indigenous communities.

“This proposed bill ignores the international commitments made by Brazil to guarantee the rights to participation of indigenous populations in the decision-making process related to the exploitation of the natural resources on the areas they traditionally occupy,” said Maira Irigaray, Brazil co-ordinator for Amazon Watch.

“In this sense, this bill is another attempt at diminishing these rights, and reinforcing the predatory exploitation model in Brazil.”

Amazon Watch also raised concerns over the regulation of activities by the energy sector in the Amazon, which would be overseen by the new state body.

Last month, a report by the Brazilian NGO Imazon showed that deforestation had almost tripled in the Amazon in March compared to last year. Figures gathered using a programme developed by Google Earth found a 195 per cent increase in the amount of forest destruction.
Greenpeace said the deforestation of the Amazon had contributed to climate change, which has led to severe weather incidents such as the current drought in São Paulo.

The charity said it was following the developments of the draft bill, which will go before a special commission once its members have been named.

Under the Brazilian legislative system, a draft bill must pass through various committee readings for revisions before it can be voted upon, in a process that could take decades and still be shelved.

 

Climate Change a 'Hoax', Claims Adviser to Australia's PM

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article41793.htm

May 09, 2015 "Information Clearing House" - "TS" - The head of the Abbott government's Business Advisory Council claims climate science is a new world order conspiracy involving the United Nations, democracy-hating environmentalists and Chinese communists.

The scientific consensus on climate change is the product of a global conspiracy to stamp out democracy and impose a totalitarian new world order, according to dubious claims made Friday by a senior Australian government adviser.

The scientific consensus on climate change is “not about facts or logic,” according to Maurice Newman, the chairperson of Prime Minister Tony Abbott's Business Advisory Council.

“It’s about a new world order under the control of the U.N.,” he argued.

Newman's council is Abbott's top advisory group for business affairs, and has played a key role in formulating government policy since 2013.

The senior government adviser claimed Australia should “resist” international calls for action on climate change, accusing the United Nations of secretly steering a global agenda aimed at “concentrating political authority.”

“Global warming is the hook,” Newman argued.

The chief executive of the independent Climate Council, Amanda McKenzie, responded to Newman's article by calling for his resignation.

“He is either intentionally misleading the public or he is incapable of understanding scientific consensus, in which case he has no business advising the government,” she said, according to AFP.

Climate scientists overwhelmingly say climate change is real, and being exacerbated by human activity. The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says global temperatures could increase by 4.8 degrees Celcius by the end of the century, which would spell disaster for much of the world's population.

The Climate Council is largely comprised of former members of the government-funded Climate Commission, which was abolished by Abbott's government.

Prior to coming to power in 2013, Abbott once described climate change as “absolute crap.” Since coming to power, Abbott has been accused by critics of not taking climate change seriously. Along with appointing Newman as a top adviser, Abbott has also tapped former oil company chairperson Dick Warburton to lead a review of Australia's renewable energy target.

Warburton is a self declared climate skeptic, and his review called for the government to slash renewable energy subsidies, and adopt policies that would increase the value of coal-fired power plants. Warburton claimed neither his history in the fossil fuel industry or his rejection of climate science influenced the outcome of the review.