Shocking Climate Disasters: Drought, Floods, Disease, Bees, Fracking, Deforestation

California Drought Forces Ranchers To Take Cattle East. Ranchers in the Golden State are loading tens of thousands of heifers and steers onto trucks and hauling them eastward to Nevada, Texas, Nebraska and beyond.

 

Killer Pig Virus Wipes Out More Than 10 Percent Of Nation’s Hogs. The highly contagious Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus is puzzling scientists searching for its origins and its cure and leaving farmers devastated in ways that go beyond financial losses.

 

2014 Goldman Prizes Bestowed on ‘Fearless’ Eco-Activists. This year’s recipients are six individuals from four continents, honored for their “fearless” efforts and working “against all odds to protect the environment and their communities.”

The 2014 Goldman Environmental Award winners from (clock wise from top left): Desmond D’sa, South Africa; Ramesh Agrawal, India; Suren Gazaryan, Russia; Rudi Putra, Indonesia; Helen Holden Slottje, USA; and Ruth Buendia Mestoquiari, Peru. (Images: Goldman Environmental Foundation)

 

Pesticide Pushers Spin Bee Crisis to Protect Profits. As bee collapse threatens global food supply, report says chemical industry employing Big Tobacco-style PR blitz to deflect blame.

 

Holding The Silent Killers Of Environment Accountable. It is up to us to make a major transition to a carbon-free, nuclear-free energy economy within that timeframe. Big Energy and our plutocratic government are not going to do it without effective pressure from a people-powered movement.

 

Oil CEO Says Obama Is Wrong On Natural Gas– Go Green Instead. There’s been a lot of talk about natural gas as a “transition fuel” in the rapidly unfolding climate conundrum. We cannot afford the hundreds of billions of dollars, the commitment to a fossil fuel industry, the gigatons of emissions, or the delay.

 

Green Group Sues US Government For Hiding Tar Sands Plan. The National Wildlife Federation filed a lawsuit this week charging the State Department is refusing to disclose public information about a pipeline company’s possible plans to transport dangerous tar sands oil from Montreal to the coast of Maine.

 

 Reproductive Rights Have a Rocky Ride. For policy makers and activists working for sexual and reproductive health and rights, it’s been a long road since the landmark International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo in 1994.

 

The year climate change closed Everest. The deadly avalanche on Mount Everest earlier this month was an “ice release”. The worst accident in the mountain’s history has ended the 2014 climbing season. And some see global warming as the key culprit. 

 

Will global warming produce more tornadoes?  In the wake of a devastating series of twister strikes, here’s what the latest science has to say.

An automobile dealer surveys the tornado damage to one of his trucks in Mayflower, Arkansas, on Sunday. Danny Johnston/AP Photo

 

Natural gas-gobbling bacteria may help combat oil leaks. A type of bacteria that eats natural gases may provide a small defence against leaks such as BP’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill in 2010 and curb global warming, a scientific report said on Monday.

 

Bluegrass Pipeline project comes to a halt. Developers of a multi-state pipeline project, which has stirred controversy over the past year in Kentucky, announced Monday they have suspended all investment in the project indefinitely.

 

Can the battle against deforestation be won? One persistently poor country has given its scientists a voice and taken action to protect both domestic resources and the global climate. But good intentions are clashing with harsh social, political and economic realities.

Aerial view of the Amazon Rainforest in the Brazilian state of Amazonas. Credit: Neil Palmer, International Center of Tropical Agriculture

 

Exxon’s $900 billion Arctic prize at risk after Ukraine. Exxon Mobil’s dream of drilling in the Russian Arctic may risk running aground on the politics of Ukraine. 

Satellite view of the Ob and Yenisei rivers as they carry sediments into the Kara Sea.

 

After Vermont bill, GMO labeling becomes center of debate on bioengineering’s future. Vermont could be the tipping point in a movement to inform consumers about whether their food contains genetically-modified ingredients.

 

French children exposed to dangerous cocktail of pesticides, campaigners say. French children in agricultural areas are being exposed to a dangerous cocktail of pesticides, some of them banned, a French health and environment group claimed on Tuesday.

The samples were taken from children living between 50 and 200 metres from agricultural zones. Photograph: Pascal Rossignol/Reuters

 

Tens of thousands of Afghans displaced after deadly floods. Flash floods in northern Afghanistan have killed more than 120 people and forced tens of thousands from their homes, aid agencies and the United Nations said on Monday.

 

No sure cure for China’s soil pollution. In Shimen County in central China’s Hunan Province, more than 1,000 villagers have fallen victim to arsenic poisoning.

 

Warning over ‘privatisation’ of environmental science research body. Long-term research in Britain on issues ranging from bees to tree disease could be threatened by plans to open up the environment department’s science agency to private investment, MPs and unions say.

 

Big Oil’s Investment in the NRA Could Reshape U.S. Energy, Land and Wildlife Policy. As part of a major effort to bolster its lobbying and political power, the oil and gas industry has expanded contributions and influence over several Safari Club International (SCI), the National Rifle Association (NRA), and the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation (CSF).  

 

Rice University Researchers Create Tiny Film That Could Replace Lithium Batteries. It’s only one one-hundredth of an inch thick.

Called an electrochemical capacitor, the film contains nanoporous nickel-fluoride electrodes layered around a solid electrolyte designed to “deliver battery-like supercapacitor performance.”

 

Sources: Common Dreams, Daily Climate, Eco Watch, The Guardian, HuffPost Green, IPS, Popular Resistance, Shanghai Daily, Trust,org.

 Paul Brown is a retired neuroscience professor whose primary interests are human rights, overpopulation, mass extinction, global warming, and the military-industrial complex. Links to all his Before It’s News articles are at /contributor/pages/189/210/stories.html.