Rising acid levels in the world’s oceans now threatens everything from coral reefs to global food security, Jane Lubchenco, the head of America’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said on Monday. The level of acid in oceans now rivals climate change as its “equally evil twin,” she told AP. “We’ve got sort of the […]
An Israeli research team discovers a mechanism whereby even tiny seemingly insignificant chemical changes in a creature can affect the ecology of the earth. Snakes, spiders and creepy-crawly things that go bump in the night are the creatures of children’s nightmares. But who ever thought that the little critters might actually be scared of each […]
Last week global warming’s wrath swept through the United States and hardly anybody took notice. The worst wildfires in Colorado and Utah history torched hundreds of homes and miles of forest. The Waldo Canyon fire alone, which is still only 45% contained, burned 350 houses right down to the ground. Some residents returned yesterday to […]
Measuring sea levels in the face of global warming isn’t easy, but it’s important to understand on a global scale Can wasted water contribute to rising sea levels? The answer is a global climate mystery. Given the known increase in average global temperatures, the thermal expansion coefficient of water and the known loss of polar ice, […]
Monitoring stations all over the arctic are reading greenhouse gas concentrations of 400 parts per million – a grim new milestone that dims hope of reversing runaway climate change. Millions of pounds of methane lay dormant in arctic ice, threatening to accelerate climate change when it melts, violent weather, drought, flooding and other disasters are […]
The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan has wrapped up a national phase-out of all central cooling systems using chlorofluorocarbons (CFC), reports the Jordan Times: “Jordan’s program for phasing out the use of CFCs, aimed at disposing 1500 tons of the harmful substance, was achieved one year ahead of schedule”, said Ghazi Odat, Director of the Ministry of Environment’s […]
Sturdy wild wheat and barley are essential for humanity’s survival. New study shows we are losing genetic diversity Israel’s wild wheat and barley are known to be the ancestors of our modern grains. When Man cultivated them, their genetic resistance to drought and disease carried over to cultivated varieties. This aided mankind’s struggle to grow […]
Few ideas are more absurd to me than this: because people refuse to cut back on beef consumption, catastrophic levels of methane are being released into the atmosphere each year. Even Forbes wrote in a recent report that cutting back on meat is one of the fastest ways we can slash our carbon emissions and […]
Scientists warn that we are about to hit a tipping point beyond which it will be impossible to curb runaway global warming. Scientists gathered at the Planet Under Pressure Conference in London warn that failure to drastically slash greenhouse gas emissions this decade could push the planet past certain thresholds that would keep climate change […]
“We are not rabbits,” was among the slogans against the “oil shale experiment” march today in Israel. A story of Davids versus the Goliaths? Valley of Elah residents, Greenpeace members and local NGOS in Israel organized a march today against the development of oil shale in Israel. Oil shale and its extraction remains a very […]
The Malacca Straits Mosque in Malaysia is arguably the world’s most beautiful and it is vulnerable to rising seas. Malaysia is one of the few countries that share Dubai’s obsession with manmade islands and grandeur. We have often cast a critical eye on the Emirate’s core developers for building artificial islands that have wrecked havoc […]
If you are of the 41 percent that lives in drylands, your future depends on supporting plant biodiversity. An international team of researchers including Dr. Bertrand Boeken of the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev suggest in a new study that plant biodiversity preservation is crucial to buffer negative […]
Ever since the classic The Book Of One Thousand and One Nights, which include tales on Aladdin and the Lamp, Sinbad the Sailor and Alai Babba and the Forty Thieves, the Arabian Peninsula, and seacoasts have never been the same. While the characters may be fictional (or maybe not?), the actual location of these magical […]
Nearly 3 billion people lack safe and efficient cooking gear. It’s time to make the problem in the kitchen sexier. Half the world’s households prepare their meals over open fires or with jerry-rigged cookers fueled by scrap wood, coal, combustible waste and dung. Fatal burns are common and foraged fuel dangerously degrades indoor air quality. […]
Scientists discover that every year Oman loses a little bit more of its landmass to rising sea levels. Within the next 100 years, global sea levels are expected to rise by at least 1 meter and swallow up coastal towns and cities – a reality from which the Middle East is not exempt. Already geoscientists […]