News articles on pollution
Mongabay.com news articles on pollution in blog format. Updated regularly.
Corn ethanol is worsening the Gulf dead zone
(03/10/2008) Proposed legislation that will expand corn-ethanol production in the United States will worsen the growing "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico and hurt marine fisheries, report researchers writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Mercury from coal-burning hurts the common loon
(03/04/2008) A long-term study by the Wildlife conservation Society, the BioDiversity Research Institute, and other organizations has found and confirmed that environmental mercury--much of which comes from human-generated emissions--is impacting both the health and reproductive success of common loons in the Northeast.
Expedition finds inverted pyramid where sharks dominate marine ecology
(02/25/2008) A survey of a remote Pacific archipelago turned up pristine coral reefs that could offer a "baseline" for measuring the human impact on reefs worldwide, report researchers from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) at the University of California at San Diego.
Planktos kills iron fertilization project due to environmental opposition
(02/19/2008) Planktos, a California-based firm that planned a controversial iron-fertilization scheme in an attempt to qualify carbon offsets, announced that it failed to find sufficient funding for its efforts and would postpone its project indefinitely.
Nike to launch "green" eco-shoe
(02/15/2008) When Nike unveils the $185 Air Jordan XX3 this weekend at the NBA All-Star Game festivities this weekend, it will be the culmination of a company-wide effort to reduce the environmental impact of its footwear manufacturing, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Warming could bring sharks to Antarctica with devastating ecological consequences
(02/15/2008) Global warming could make the waters around Antarctica hospitable to sharks for the first time in 40 million years. Their return could have devastating ecological consequences report researchers from the University of Rhode Island.
$1 trillion carbon market in the U.S. by 2020 says study
(02/14/2008) The U.S. carbon emission trading market will top $1 trillion by 2020 if policymakers continue on their current path towards a comprehensive "cap-and-trade" program, estimates an analysis released at climate roundtable discussions at the UN General Assembly in New York.
Stabilizing climate requires cutting emissions to zero
(02/14/2008) Even if greenhouse gas emissions are reduced to zero tomorrow, global temperatures would remain high for at least 500 years, according to a new study published in Geophysical Research Letters. The findings suggest that stablizing emissions at current levels will not be enough to curtail the effects of climate change.
UN: biofuels are starving the poor by driving up food prices
(02/14/2008) Echoing sentiments increasingly expressed by politicians, scientists, and advocates for the poor, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warned that the world's poorest people are suffering as a result of the push to use food crops for biofuel production.
Only 4% of the ocean is pristine according to first oceanic map of human-impact
(02/14/2008) There is a much used adage regarding the ocean that goes something like this: we know more about our solar system than our ocean. Whether or not one believes this to be true (less than 5% of the ocean has been explored), a group of over twenty researchers, by agglomerating the available information on the oceans, have created a large-scale image of the ocean's health.
Bloomberg: global warming "just as lethal" as terrorism
(02/12/2008) New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters Monday that global warming is as big a threat to humanity as terrorism, according to Reuters.
Biofuels are worsening global warming
(02/07/2008) Converting native ecosystems for production of biofuel feed stocks is worsening the greenhouse gas emissions they are intended to mitigate, reports a pair of studies published in the journal Science. The studies follow a series of reports that have linked ethanol and biodiesel production to increased carbon dioxide emissions, destruction of biodiverse forest and savanna habitats, and water and air pollution.
Sunscreen damages coral reefs
(01/31/2008) Sunscreen can damage reefs by worsening viral infections in symbiotic algae that provide corals with sustenance, reports Nature News
Scientists suggest new geological epoch: ours
(01/30/2008) It would be called the Anthropocene. The word was coined by chemist and Nobel Prize winner Paul Crutzen at a conference in 2000. It denotes a new geological epoch, beginning about 200 years ago at the time of the Industrial Revolution, when our planet's systems were increasingly affected by our species. While the term Anthropocene has been used informally for years, a recent peer-reviewed British paper argues that it is now time to officially accept Anthropocene as a distinct era and to leave the Holocene to the pre-Industrial past.
Rich countries grow at ecological expense of poor countries
(01/21/2008) The costs of environmental degradation caused by rich countries are disproportionately falling on the world's poorest countries, reports an analysis published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
U.S. biofuels policy drives deforestation in Indonesia, the Amazon
(01/17/2008) U.S. incentives for biofuel production are promoting deforestation in southeast Asia and the Amazon by driving up crop prices and displacing energy feedstock production, say researchers.
Cellulosic ethanol production could fight Gulf Dead Zone, help fisheries
(01/16/2008) Feedstocks for cellulosic ethanol production could help fight the massive "dead zone" that forms each year in the Gulf of Mexico as a result of current farming practices, says a University of Alabama in Huntsville biologist.
Extremely high levels of mercury and arsenic found in Chinese lake
(01/10/2008) A team of researchers, led by biologists at Dartmouth, has found potentially dangerous levels of mercury and arsenic in Lake Baiyangdian, the largest lake in the North China Plain and a source of both food and drinking water for the people who live around it.
Human activity is killing coral reefs in the Caribbean
(01/08/2008) A wide and thorough study of the Caribbean's coral reefs--including 322 sites in 13 countries--has shown that the main indicator of coral destruction in the Caribbean is the proximity of human populations: the larger the population the greater the deterioration of the reefs. Contributing factors are numerous, but the study showed that coastal development causes the most damage to coral reefs and fish populations, because of increased sewage and fishing pressure; while proximity to agriculture results in macroalgae due to runoff of agricultural chemicals.
Transportation accounts for 15% of global emissions
(01/07/2008) The transport sector accounts for 15 percent of carbon dioxide emissions and 31 percent of ozone released into the atmosphere by humankind, reports a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Can China Go Green?
(01/03/2008) China's booming economic growth over the past generation has come at the expense of the environment, putting its economic health at risk, argues a policy piece published in the journal Science.
Leading biofuels wreak environmental havoc
(01/03/2008) Biofuels made from world's dominant energy crops -- including corn, soy, and oil palm -- may have worse environment impacts than conventional fossil fuels, reports a study published in the journal Science.
Christmas shopping habits help drive global warming
(12/14/2007) Just as the conference in Bali on global warming wraps up with a middling agreement, consumers in the US and Europe are rushing to holiday stores, mostly unaware of how their Christmas consumerism affects global warming. The British independent think-tank, Nef (new economics foundation) has released a report highlighting the environmental cost of holiday shopping.
Fish farms are killing wild salmon in British Columbia
(12/13/2007) Parasitic sea lice infestations caused by salmon farms are driving nearby populations of wild salmon toward extinction, reports a study published in the December 14 issue of the journal Science.
Cooking oil, palm oil biodiesel can reduce emissions relative to diesel
(11/28/2007) A lifecycle analysis of biodiesel by Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) shows that using palm oil derived from existing plantations can be an effective biofuel feedstock for reducing greenhouse gas emissions relative to conventional diesel fuel. However, palm oil sourced from rainforest and peatlands generating emissions 8 to 21 times greater than those from diesel.
Shipping industry struggles with pollution
(11/28/2007) Pollution is a rising concern for the cargo shipping industry which carries more than 90% of the world's merchandise by volume, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Drought hurts carbon sinks in North America
(11/26/2007) A new system for tracking carbon uptake in North America, shows that deciduous forests along the East Coast (32 percent) and the boreal coniferous forests (22 percent) of northern Canada absorbed the bulk of carbon dioxide emissions between 2000 and 2005, but suggests that climate change may increasingly affect carbon sinks, according to research published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
Greenhouse gas levels rise to new record in 2006
(11/23/2007) Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels hit a new record in 2006 according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the U.N. weather agency.
7-year old nature guide becomes Belize environmental hero as adult
(11/16/2007) Each year hundreds of thousands of nature-oriented tourists visit Belize to see the Central American country's spectacular coral reefs, biodiverse rainforests, and ancient Mayan ruins. However few visitors realize that Belize's natural resources are at risk. Timber and oil extraction, agricultural encroachment, coastal development, pollution and unrestrained tourism are all increasing threats to Belizean ecosystems. Unless something is done to address these concerns, within a generation these pressures could present considerable problems for Belize. Dr. Colin Young, head of the environmental science program at Galen University in Belize, says that while he is greatly concerned about these issues, there is still time to ensure healthy forests and reefs in Belize.
Changing carbon cycle may worsen U.S. CO2 emissions
(11/14/2007) The first State of the Carbon Cycle Report for North America, released online this week by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, finds the continent's carbon budget increasingly overwhelmed by human-caused emissions. North American sources release nearly 2 billion tons of carbon into the atmosphere each year, mostly as carbon dioxide. Carbon sinks such as growing forests may remove up to half this amount, but these current sinks may turn into new sources as climate changes.
New system tracks CO2 emissions of 50,000 power plants worldwide
(11/14/2007) A new online database allows users to track carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of 50,000 power plants worldwide. The system, called CARMA—Carbon Monitoring for Action, was developed by the Center for Global Development (CGD), an policy and research group.
China's coal pollutes the U.S.
(11/04/2007) It takes five to 10 days for the pollution from China's coal-fired plants to make its way to the United States, like a slow-moving storm. It shows up as mercury in the bass and trout caught in Oregon's Willamette River. It increases cloud cover and raises ozone levels. And along the way, it contributes to acid rain in Japan and South Korea and health problems everywhere from Taiyuan to the United States. This is the dark side of the world's growing use of coal.
China to spend $14.4 billion clean up polluted lake
(10/29/2007) China will spend $14.4 billion to clean up one of the country's largest and most polluted lakes, according to a report in the International Herald Tribune.
China struggles with urban pollution
(10/29/2007) About 60 percent of Chinese cities still regularly suffer from air pollution and have no centralized sewage treatment facilities, according to a report by China's environment watchdog, the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA).
Honda sees no future for plug-in hybrid vehicles
(10/23/2007) Honda Motor Co. Chief Executive Takeo Fukui said plug-in hybrid gasoline-electric vehicles offered too few environmental benefits to be worth pursing for the Japanese car company, according to the Wall Street Journal. Instead Fukui suggested that improved batteries would be better used for electric vehicles.
North Atlantic carbon sinks absorbing less CO2
(10/23/2007) The capacity of the North Atlantic ocean to absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) has declined significantly since in the mid 1990s, report researchers from the University of East Anglia. The findings raise concerns that oceans may be slowing their uptake of CO2, potentially worsening the climate impact of greenhouse gas emissions.
Carbon sinks failing to keep up with emissions
(10/22/2007) Atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) growth has increased 35 percent faster than expected since 2000, report scientists writing in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Worryingly, more than half the increase came from a decreased efficiency of natural land and ocean sinks to absorb CO2 from the atmosphere. The reminder came from a slowing in the efficiency of use of fossil fuels.
CO2 emissions cause ocean acidification, threaten sea life
(09/21/2007) Human-induced carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions could alter ocean chemistry to the point where it will violate U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Quality Criteria by mid-century if emissions are not significantly reduce, reports a team of scientists writing in the September 25, 2007 issue of Geophysical Research Letters. The commentary is the first to warn that atmospheric CO2 emissions will cause ocean waters to violate EPA water quality criteria.
Bush aides say mankind responsible for global warming
(09/14/2007) Dr. John Marburger, President George W. Bush's chief scientific advisor, said it is more than 90 percent certain that greenhouse gas emissions to blame for rising global temperatures, according to BBC News.
38 key global environmental indicators worsen - report
(09/14/2007) Consumption of energy and many other critical resources is consistently breaking records, disrupting the climate and undermining life on the planet, according to the latest Worldwatch Institute report, Vital Signs 2007-2008.
Carbon tax, not subsidies, will spur nuclear power
(09/09/2007) A U.S. carbon tax, not government subsidies, should be used to spur investment in nuclear power, says The Economist.
Industrial pollution acidifies ocean, threatens marine animals
(09/03/2007) Ocean acidification, already a concern due to rising levels of carbon dioxide, is worsening due to nitric acid and sulfuric acid from industry, report researchers writing in this week's issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS).
Rare Chinese river dolphin sighting in doubt
(09/01/2007) A prominent researcher is skeptical of last week's reported sighting of the baiji, the Chinese river dolphin declared extinct earlier this year, according to the New York Times. The sighting near Tongling city in Anhui Province -- widely reported in Chinese and Western media -- was captured on video.
Environmental, safety concerns mount over China's Three Gorges Dam
(08/29/2007) Environmental problems are worse than anticipated at China's massive Three Gorges Dam, reports the The Wall Street Journal. A year after its completion, there are rising concerns of pollution, landslides, and flooding.
"Extinct" baiji river dolphin spotted alive in China
(08/29/2007) An "extinct" baiji has been spotted alive in the Yangtze River, reports Chinese state media.
U.S. firms driving pollution in China
(08/22/2007) U.S. firms are helping drive environmental degradation in China, putting the health of millions of Chinese at risk, reports The Wall Street Journal. The paper says that by demanding ever lower products for goods, manufacturers are forced to reduced environmental safeguards in order to compete.
China to miss pollution goals for 2007
(08/22/2007) China has managed to cut emissions of sulphur dioxide, an acid-rain causing pollutant, during the first half of 2007 but is likely to miss reduction targets for the year, reports the State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA).
Climate change reducing Lake Tahoe's water clarity
(08/15/2007) Lake Tahoe in Northern California is losing is characteristic water clarity due to pollution and climate change, reports a new study by the University of California at Davis.
Islands to face water problems as sea levels rise, populations grow
(08/15/2007) Islands in the tropical Pacific may face water problems as sea levels rise and populations grow, warns research published in Vadose Zone Journal.
Industrial pollution has caused Arctic warming since 1880s
(08/09/2007) Industrial soot emissions have been warming the Arctic since at the least the 1880s, reports a new study that examined "black carbon" levels in the Greenland ice sheet over the past 215 years. The research is published in current issue of the journal Science.
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