ECOLOGY

ORANGUTANS THREATENED BY ILLEGAL LOGGING IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

BBC - Illegal logging is destroying forests in South-East Asia quicker
than had been feared, with dire implications for orangutans, a UN report
has said. The practice threatens many other species in the region, the
United Nations Environment Program says. If no action is taken, the
report says, 98% of forests on the islands of Sumatra and Borneo may be
gone by 2022. This would have serious consequences for local people and
wildlife including rhinos, tigers and elephants. "The situation is now
acute for the orangutans," the authors wrote.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6337107.stm

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UN ADVISOR: WORLD IS RUNNING OUT OF WATER

RANDEEP RAMESH, GUARDIAN, UK - The world is running out of water and
needs a radical plan to tackle shortages that threaten the ability of
humanity to feed itself, according to Jeffrey Sachs, director of the
UN's Millennium Project. . . Article continues "In 2050 we will have 9
billion people and average income will be four times what it is today.
India and China have been able to feed their populations because they
use water in an unsustainable way. That is no longer possible," he said.
Since Asia's green revolution, which began in the 1960s and saw a
transformation of agricultural production, the amount of land under
irrigation has tripled. However, many parts of the continent have
reached the limits of their water supplies. "The Ganges [in India] and
the Yellow river [in China] no longer flow. There is so much silting up
and water extraction upstream they are pretty stagnant," said Prof
Sachs. . .

http://environment.guardian.co.uk/water/story/0,,1996211,00.html

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TUNA DISAPPEARING

WORLD WILDLIFE FUND - Tuna are fast disappearing, with important stocks
at high risk of commercial extinction due to weak management, warns a
WWF briefing ahead of the first meeting of government members of the
world's five tuna management organizations. Populations of important
species such as bluefin tuna are critically depleted. Atlantic bluefin,
used for high-end sushi and sashimi, is massively overfished and the
spawning stock of Southern bluefin tuna in the Indian Ocean is down
about 90 per cent.

The capacity of the world's tuna fleets are now far greater than
required to catch the legal quota. In 2002 in the Eastern Pacific Ocean,
the capacity of purse-seine fleets targeting bigeye and yellowfin tuna
was 70 per cent higher than needed to catch the quantity advised by
scientists.

http://www.panda.org/news_facts/newsroom/index.cfm?uNewsID=92280

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NEW SCIENTIST: MAJOR NEW CLIMATE REPORT TO PREDICT 4-7 DEGREE
TEMPERATURE RISE

NEW SCIENTIST - The most important report on the science of climate
change for six years is set for release on Friday 2 February, and leaks
suggest it will be an alarming read. The minimum predicted temperature
and sea level rises will jump, according to media reports, while the
blame will be pinned firmly on greenhouse gas emissions from human
activities. Its leading line is expected to be "there is a 90% chance
humans are responsible for climate change", mostly due to the burning of
fossil fuels. That contrasts with the last version of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's report, issued in 2001,
which concluded there was a 66% chance that humans were responsible for
rising temperatures.

The new IPCC report is expected to predict that temperatures will rise
by [4-7 degrees F] by 2100.

Similarly, the new report is believed to predict that sea-levels will
rise by [a foot to a foot and a half] 2100. . .

But even these changes are regarded by some as a conservative estimates
arrived at by consensus. . .

IPCC chairman, R K Pachauri. . . told Reuters that the report's findings
will be "far more serious and much more a matter of concern" than in
previous reports. For instance, it was previously thought that it would
take hundreds of years for the Greenland ice sheet to melt right the way
through. . . In 2006, satellite data suggested the ice sheet was
disappearing three times faster than previously thought.

http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn11049-major-climate-
change-report-looks-set-to-alarm.html

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RECYCLE YOURSELF IN CARDBOARD: THE NEW BURIAL

TORONTO STAR - Several groups are trying to establish Canada's first
natural burial cemetery. . . This latest back-to-the-earth movement
started in England about a dozen years ago, then spread to the United
States, where four green cemeteries have blossomed, including one in
upstate New York. A green goodbye means no toxic embalming chemicals
such as formaldehyde. That one is on the European Union's list for
possible banning.

A nature-loving corpse is entombed in a biodegradable container or
shroud. "The metal from coffins buried each year in the U.S. is more
than was used to build the Golden Gate Bridge," says Joe Sehee, founder
of the Green Burial Council in the U.S., which sets ethical standards
for the budding practice.

Rather than rip out a hunk of rainforest for a coffin, a burial box
might be made from locally harvested wood, wicker or even recycled
paper, perhaps decorated with good-bye messages from friends. . .

In upstate New York's Finger Lakes region, Greensprings Natural Cemetery
is 100 acres of old pastures and fields bounded by two 4,000-acre
protected forests. Opened last May, the cemetery has sold 55 sites. . .
A Greensprings gravesite costs $500 with another $450 to open and close
it.

http://www.thestar.com/Health/article/174974

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150 CLIMATE SCIENTISTS REPORT POLITICAL INTERFERENCE

DEBORAH ZABARENKO, REUTERS - U.S. scientists felt pressured to tailor
their writings on global warming to fit the Bush administration's
skepticism, in some cases at the behest of an ex-oil industry lobbyist,
a congressional committee heard on Tuesday. "Our investigations found
high-quality science struggling to get out," Francesca Grifo of the
watchdog group Union of Concerned Scientists told members of the House
Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

A survey by the group found that 150 climate scientists personally
experienced political interference in the past five years, for a total
of at least 435 incidents. "Nearly half of all respondents perceived or
personally experienced pressure to eliminate the words 'climate change,'
'global warming' or other similar terms from a variety of
communications," Grifo said.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0130-10.htm

SUZANNE GOLDENBERG, GUARDIAN - The Bush administration was yesterday
accused of systemic tampering with the work of government climate
scientists to eliminate politically inconvenient material about global
warming. At a hearing of Congress, scientists and advocacy groups
described a campaign by the White House to remove references to global
warming from scientific reports and limit public mention of the topic to
avoid pressure on an administration opposed to mandatory controls on
greenhouse gas emissions. Such pressure extended even to the use of the
words "global warming" or "climate change", said a report released
yesterday by the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Government
Accountability Project. The report said nearly half of climate
scientists at government agencies had been advised against using those
terms. . .

Forty-three percent of respondents said their published work had been
revised in ways that altered the meaning of scientific findings. Some
38% said they had direct knowledge of cases where scientific information
on climate was stripped from websites and printed reports.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,2002334,00.html

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NOW WE NEED SOME SUSTAINABLE TAX COLLECTORS

PRESS ASSOCIATION - Homeowners who spend money on eco-friendly wind
turbines may face higher council taxes, MPs have warned. An all-party
Commons trade and industry committee report says that "if home owners
invest in solar panels, wind turbines or energy efficiency measures,
this is likely to increase the value of their properties and result in
higher council tax bills." That is the wrong approach, the report says,
suggesting that central and local government must reduce the barriers
faced by people and organizations that want to exploit local low-carbon
energy sources

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,,-6380274,00.html

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MORE FROM FORTHCOMING CLIMATE REPORT

AGE - Millions of people will suffer water shortages and the number of
hungry will grow by hundreds of millions by 2080 as global temperatures
rise, scientists warn in a new report. The report estimates that between
1.1 billion and 3.2 billion people will be suffering from water scarcity
problems by 2080 and between 200 million and 600 million more people
will be going hungry. . .

Rising sea levels could flood seven million more homes, while
Australia's famed Great Barrier Reef, treasured as the world's largest
living organism, could be dead within decades, the scientists warn, the
newspaper said. . .

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2007/01/30/070130081454.ieaxdzu8.html

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