| WHO raises pandemic alert level from 4 to 5 as swine flu spreads Concerned over the rapidly spreading swine flu, the World Health Organization (WHO) has upped the influenza pandemic alert to phase 5, just one step short of declaring a bona fide global pandemic. [More] rss.sciam.com |
Obama Puts Brakes on Mountaintop Removal The Obama administration announced a plan today for curbing the use of streamlined federal permitting for mountaintop coal mining and boosting efforts to protect rivers and streams from mining debris. [More] Presented By:You Need the Speed of Norton 2009Introducing the revolutionary Norton Internet Security 2009. With a one-click, one-minute install, under 7MB of memory usage and fewer, shorter scans, it?s the fastest security suite anywhere. Get your FREE trial today!Click to Learn More www.norton.com/speed Ads by Pheedo rss.sciam.com |
The Obama Administration's Take on "Clean" Coal Dear EarthTalk: As I understand it, “clean” coal really isn’t--yet the Bush Administration gushed strongly for it. What is Obama’s take on it? -- John Zippert, Eutaw, AL [More] rss.sciam.com |
Is geoengineering humanity's last hope to avoid catastrophic global warming? Do you really want to start messing with the atmosphere? If not, then stop emitting so much CO 2 . Or so argues the U.K.-based Royal Society, the same people who brought you Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and Stephen Hawking. A new report by the Society analyzes so-called geoengineering--"the deliberate large-scale manipulation of the planetary environment," or consciously tweaking Earth's climate in an attempt to stave off global warming--and finds that it is feasible and worth studying carefully, but probably not something we want to get involved in. [More] rss.sciam.com |
Intolerable Beauty: Plastic Garbage Kills the Albatross Each year thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway Atoll from starvation, toxicity and choking. The culprit: plastic trash accumulating across a vast area of ocean known as the Pacific Gyre . The nesting babies on the tiny, remote island are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the polluted water collecting what to them looks like food.Chris Jordan, a photographic artist and cultural activist, recently photographed the albatross’s fate. He says that in order for people to really become inspired about cleaning up the planet, sometimes we have to stop and grieve about what is being lost every day. [More] rss.sciam.com |