The vice-chancellor of the University of East Anglia gave "inaccurate" information to MPs when he told them that the university was setting up an inquiry into the reliability of key scientific climate change papers produced by his researchers, according to the man who led the inquiry.Lord Oxburgh told MPs on the science and technology select committee today that Edward Acton had been wrong to tell the same committee in March that his inquiry would look into the science itself."I think that was inaccurate," he told the MPs. "This had to be done rapidly. This was their concern. They really wanted something within a month. There was no way our panel could evaluate the science."Committee member Graham Stringer MP said this went against what the university had said at the time.
The vice-chancellor of the University of East Anglia gave "inaccurate" information to MPs when he told them that the university was setting up an inquiry into the reliability of key scientific climate change papers produced by his researchers, according to the man who led the inquiry.
Lord Oxburgh told MPs on the science and technology select committee today that Edward Acton had been wrong to tell the same committee in March that his inquiry would look into the science itself.
"I think that was inaccurate," he told the MPs. "This had to be done rapidly. This was their concern. They really wanted something within a month. There was no way our panel could evaluate the science."
Committee member Graham Stringer MP said this went against what the university had said at the time.
The EU has agreed on new rules aimed at reducing the number of animals used in lab experiments and tightening controls over such procedures. Euro MPs backed the new EU directive after long negotiations and EU member states have two years to make it law. Labs will have to get approval from national authorities for animal tests and if recognised alternatives exist then they must be used, the rules say. Animal welfare groups say the directive still does not go far enough.
The EU has agreed on new rules aimed at reducing the number of animals used in lab experiments and tightening controls over such procedures.
Euro MPs backed the new EU directive after long negotiations and EU member states have two years to make it law.
Labs will have to get approval from national authorities for animal tests and if recognised alternatives exist then they must be used, the rules say.
Animal welfare groups say the directive still does not go far enough.
A war of words broke out today between BP and Transocean after a long-awaited report by the oil company into the worst crude spill in US history placed much of the blame on the US rig operator.The investigation team working for BP avoided making many references by name to Transocean in its summary but claimed that "multiple companies" and mistakes were at the heart of the Deepwater Horizon blowout.It went on to list eight key findings related to the causes of the accident and at least five of them appeared to come under the area of responsibility that could be attributed to Transocean rather than BP.
A war of words broke out today between BP and Transocean after a long-awaited report by the oil company into the worst crude spill in US history placed much of the blame on the US rig operator.
The investigation team working for BP avoided making many references by name to Transocean in its summary but claimed that "multiple companies" and mistakes were at the heart of the Deepwater Horizon blowout.
It went on to list eight key findings related to the causes of the accident and at least five of them appeared to come under the area of responsibility that could be attributed to Transocean rather than BP.
... "You could say local governments are trying to blackmail the central government: If you order me to do something I can't deliver, I will pass on the pressure to ordinary people," said Yang Ailun, a spokeswoman for Greenpeace China. ... <...> ... Energy intensity fell by 14.4 percent by the end of 2009 after thousands of antiquated steel mills and other factories were forced to close, the government says. But it crept back up by 0.9 percent in the first half of this year. Beijing reacted by ordering 2,087 steel and cement mills and other factories with poor environmental controls to close. The Cabinet stepped up pressure on local leaders by sending inspectors to 18 of China's 32 provinces and major regions to enforce efficiency. "They understand that if they fail to meet this target it could potentially cast doubt not just internationally but domestically about whether China is serious about tackling its emissions," said Greenpeace's Yang. Yang said environmentalists welcome moves to close antiquated factories because that improves overall efficiency. But she said temporary blanket cuts come at a high social cost and the government should be taking more long-term steps such as changing energy pricing to encourage conservation. "What they are doing now is relying too much on harsh administrative orders," she said. In some ways, the power cuts are backfiring. Han, the manager in Anping, said his wire factory coped by purchasing its own generator. So it still uses power -- but from a source that might be dirtier and less efficient. ...
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... Energy intensity fell by 14.4 percent by the end of 2009 after thousands of antiquated steel mills and other factories were forced to close, the government says. But it crept back up by 0.9 percent in the first half of this year.
Beijing reacted by ordering 2,087 steel and cement mills and other factories with poor environmental controls to close. The Cabinet stepped up pressure on local leaders by sending inspectors to 18 of China's 32 provinces and major regions to enforce efficiency.
"They understand that if they fail to meet this target it could potentially cast doubt not just internationally but domestically about whether China is serious about tackling its emissions," said Greenpeace's Yang.
Yang said environmentalists welcome moves to close antiquated factories because that improves overall efficiency. But she said temporary blanket cuts come at a high social cost and the government should be taking more long-term steps such as changing energy pricing to encourage conservation.
"What they are doing now is relying too much on harsh administrative orders," she said.
In some ways, the power cuts are backfiring. Han, the manager in Anping, said his wire factory coped by purchasing its own generator. So it still uses power -- but from a source that might be dirtier and less efficient. ...
Estimates of the rate of ice loss from Greenland and West Antarctica, one of the most worrying questions in the global warming debate, should be halved, according to Dutch and US scientists.... But, according to the new study, published in the September issue of the journal Nature Geoscience, the ice estimates fail to correct for a phenomenon known as glacial isostatic adjustment. This is the term for the rebounding of Earth's crust following the last Ice Age...."The corrections for deformations of the Earth's crust have a considerable effect on the amount of ice that is estimated to be melting each year," said Vermeersen, whose team worked with NASA's Jet Propulsation Laboratory and the Netherlands Institute for Space Research.
This is the term for the rebounding of Earth's crust following the last Ice Age...."The corrections for deformations of the Earth's crust have a considerable effect on the amount of ice that is estimated to be melting each year," said Vermeersen, whose team worked with NASA's Jet Propulsation Laboratory and the Netherlands Institute for Space Research.
Tropical Storm Igor strengthened off the coast of Africa and is forecast to become a hurricane by this weekend on a track that will take it due west over some of the Atlantic's warmest water, the National Hurricane Center said.... Igor, the ninth named storm of the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season, will travel over water that is breaking records for ocean warmth. Hurricanes draw energy from hotter water, and sea surface temperatures in the area were 2 to 3 degrees Fahrenheit above normal during the last week in August.
Behind the scenes, in recent months, utilities have battled over how to allocate the costs of the new high-powered electric lines necessary to move wind energy from one part of the country to the other. Despite efforts by federal regulators to referee the fight, some experts foresee further delays in the construction of the new electric, or transmission, lines they say are essential for meeting federal and state renewable energy mandates. "A lack of transmission lines is the single greatest barrier to wind here in the Midwest. The lack of transmission has proved to be a huge barrier," says Jamie Karnik, communications manager at Wind on the Wires, an advocacy group. Karnik says the Midwest produces about 10,000 megawatts of wind now, and needs to build at least 25,000 to 40,000 further megawatts of capacity to meet state and regional renewable energy goals. Many utilities in the wind-rich Midwest would like to move excess electricity to the Northeast on new, high-powered lines. But utilities in the Northeast see Midwestern wind as a threat to its nascent offshore wind industry. While offshore wind is plentiful in the region, it has been plagued by regulatory delays and high costs. Cheap wind from the Midwest could keep the Northeast from developing its own local source of renewable power.
"A lack of transmission lines is the single greatest barrier to wind here in the Midwest. The lack of transmission has proved to be a huge barrier," says Jamie Karnik, communications manager at Wind on the Wires, an advocacy group. Karnik says the Midwest produces about 10,000 megawatts of wind now, and needs to build at least 25,000 to 40,000 further megawatts of capacity to meet state and regional renewable energy goals.
Many utilities in the wind-rich Midwest would like to move excess electricity to the Northeast on new, high-powered lines. But utilities in the Northeast see Midwestern wind as a threat to its nascent offshore wind industry. While offshore wind is plentiful in the region, it has been plagued by regulatory delays and high costs. Cheap wind from the Midwest could keep the Northeast from developing its own local source of renewable power.
For hundreds of years, naturalists didn't quite comprehend what they were. Originally these odd forms were thought to be part of the plant kingdom, which is why we still see lichens collected by botanical gardens. Eventually, microscopy enabled scientists to identify lichens as composites of mutually beneficial fungi and algae. Because fungi take the more dominant role and cultivate photosynthesizing algae for food, in return providing them a shady, moist, vitamin-rich environment, scientists have classified lichens based on their fungi species. Their identity came into dispute again when blue-green algae, a frequent component of lichens, were reclassified as cyanobacteria, a kind of bacteria that obtain energy through photosynthesis. But as it turned out, whether the fungi were harvesting algae or cyanobacteria, the symbiotic modus operandi of the lichens proved to be the same. Perhaps Trevor Goward, the lichen curator at the University of British Columbia Herbarium, describes them best. "Lichens," he says, "are fungi that have discovered agriculture." My walks in the Ozark woods impressed upon me the lichens' diversity and the confusion they can create. Sometimes their identity was clear. A lichen species known as British soldiers sports distinctive, bright red caps atop green stalks. Old man's beard can run more than three feet long and hangs from trees in the manner of Spanish moss. But without a microscope to see green clusters or strings of photosynthetic organisms running like arteries through the fungal flesh, you cannot always tell you are seeing a colony of lichens. A colony might look like a plant, an uncomplicated fungus, or even a patch of rust: here a fence speckled in autumnal reds and yellows, there some orange lace spread on a stone.
For hundreds of years, naturalists didn't quite comprehend what they were. Originally these odd forms were thought to be part of the plant kingdom, which is why we still see lichens collected by botanical gardens. Eventually, microscopy enabled scientists to identify lichens as composites of mutually beneficial fungi and algae. Because fungi take the more dominant role and cultivate photosynthesizing algae for food, in return providing them a shady, moist, vitamin-rich environment, scientists have classified lichens based on their fungi species. Their identity came into dispute again when blue-green algae, a frequent component of lichens, were reclassified as cyanobacteria, a kind of bacteria that obtain energy through photosynthesis. But as it turned out, whether the fungi were harvesting algae or cyanobacteria, the symbiotic modus operandi of the lichens proved to be the same. Perhaps Trevor Goward, the lichen curator at the University of British Columbia Herbarium, describes them best. "Lichens," he says, "are fungi that have discovered agriculture."
My walks in the Ozark woods impressed upon me the lichens' diversity and the confusion they can create. Sometimes their identity was clear. A lichen species known as British soldiers sports distinctive, bright red caps atop green stalks. Old man's beard can run more than three feet long and hangs from trees in the manner of Spanish moss. But without a microscope to see green clusters or strings of photosynthetic organisms running like arteries through the fungal flesh, you cannot always tell you are seeing a colony of lichens. A colony might look like a plant, an uncomplicated fungus, or even a patch of rust: here a fence speckled in autumnal reds and yellows, there some orange lace spread on a stone.
"Lichens," he says, "are fungi that have discovered agriculture."
And in this context, the word discovered means ...
Paging Super Sven. Svensiola? The great Guru of everything conscious. Where are you? Yoo Hoo! In the end, might makes right. Nothing has changed since the caveman.
Discovery is the observation or finding of something previously unknown. But I doubt if humans even 'discovered' agriculture. Hundreds of generations probably came between collecting wild plants for eating from the same spot each season, and making a connection between a seed and sprouting. You can't be me, I'm taken
Image: Evamariakintzel/Wikimedia Commons
Elephants Roaming America? A Big Idea for Rebooting Nature | Ecosystems | DISCOVER Magazine
On the train headed north from Amsterdam's Central Station, be sure to sit to the left. Just past the town of Almere, as you round a right-hand bend, you will find a sight unseen in Europe for centuries, if not millennia: hundreds of red deer, plodding groups of long-horned wild cattle, and skittish herds of low-slung brown horses, all moving through the open landscape like something out of a cave painting. This place goes by the name of Oostvaardersplassen. It is a nature reserve, yes, but it is also a far-reaching experiment. Biologists worldwide are increasingly talking about using large herbivores like the ones sharp-eyed passengers can spot from the train to re-create prehistoric, and sometimes even prehuman, ecosystems. When keystone species--from ancient mammoths, woolly rhinos, and giant bears to more prosaic grazers like bison, horses, and deer--are wiped out, ecosystems that had sustained themselves in perpetuity collapse. The result is a severe loss of biodiversity. By reintroducing approximations of extinct animals to modern habitats, rewilding advocates want to reestablish dynamic systems that have not existed since the rise of human settlement in Europe. This reserve is the first place where they have done more than talk. Just a short train ride from downtown Amsterdam, nearly 3,000 wild horses, deer, and descendants of prehistoric cattle roam a landscape that is being dramatically shaped by their presence. The brainchild of a pugnacious Dutch ecologist named Frans Vera, Oostvaardersplassen is challenging some of our most basic assumptions about wildness.
On the train headed north from Amsterdam's Central Station, be sure to sit to the left. Just past the town of Almere, as you round a right-hand bend, you will find a sight unseen in Europe for centuries, if not millennia: hundreds of red deer, plodding groups of long-horned wild cattle, and skittish herds of low-slung brown horses, all moving through the open landscape like something out of a cave painting. This place goes by the name of Oostvaardersplassen. It is a nature reserve, yes, but it is also a far-reaching experiment. Biologists worldwide are increasingly talking about using large herbivores like the ones sharp-eyed passengers can spot from the train to re-create prehistoric, and sometimes even prehuman, ecosystems.
When keystone species--from ancient mammoths, woolly rhinos, and giant bears to more prosaic grazers like bison, horses, and deer--are wiped out, ecosystems that had sustained themselves in perpetuity collapse. The result is a severe loss of biodiversity. By reintroducing approximations of extinct animals to modern habitats, rewilding advocates want to reestablish dynamic systems that have not existed since the rise of human settlement in Europe. This reserve is the first place where they have done more than talk. Just a short train ride from downtown Amsterdam, nearly 3,000 wild horses, deer, and descendants of prehistoric cattle roam a landscape that is being dramatically shaped by their presence.
The brainchild of a pugnacious Dutch ecologist named Frans Vera, Oostvaardersplassen is challenging some of our most basic assumptions about wildness.
SINGAPORE: China has succeeded the US as the most attractive location in which to invest in renewable energy projects. That's according to Ernst & Young's latest renewable energy country attractiveness Indices. The firm said China entered its country attractiveness indices table in 2004 and, since then, has progressed to the top of the all renewables Index. In the last index, it was tied with the US, though it now has sole claim to the top spot with a score of 69. Ernst & Young said China's steady rise to pole position has been underpinned by strong and consistent government support for renewable energy. This, together with substantial commitment from industry and the sheer scale of its natural resources, helped it to maintain its top position for renewable energy investment. The US dropped two points in the index to 67, falling behind China. It fell after a federal Renewable Energy Standard was not enacted this summer.
That's according to Ernst & Young's latest renewable energy country attractiveness Indices.
The firm said China entered its country attractiveness indices table in 2004 and, since then, has progressed to the top of the all renewables Index.
In the last index, it was tied with the US, though it now has sole claim to the top spot with a score of 69.
Ernst & Young said China's steady rise to pole position has been underpinned by strong and consistent government support for renewable energy.
This, together with substantial commitment from industry and the sheer scale of its natural resources, helped it to maintain its top position for renewable energy investment.
The US dropped two points in the index to 67, falling behind China.
It fell after a federal Renewable Energy Standard was not enacted this summer.
