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50 Numbers From 2014 That Sound Fake But That Are Actually Real
50 Numbers From 2014 That Sound Fake But That Are Actually Real.
2014 was quite a bizarre year, wasn’t it? The past 12 months brought us MH370, Ebola, civil war in Ukraine, civil unrest in Ferguson, the rise of ISIS and the fall of the Democrats in the midterm elections. Our world is becoming crazier and more unstable with each passing day, and I have a feeling that things are going to accelerate greatly in 2015. But for the moment things are relatively quiet as much of the world stops to celebrate the holiday season, so now is a good time to look back and see where we have been over the past year. The facts that I am about to share with you sound false, but they are all quite true. If you doubt any of these facts, just click the link on the number to find the source. It has been said that truth is stranger than fiction, and that was definitely the case during the past 12 months. In no particular order, the following are 50 numbers from 2014 that sound fake but that are actually real…
2.5 – Researchers have discovered that characters in cartoons for children are 2.5 times more likely to die than characters in adult dramas. But as long as those characters look cute and make funny noises it must be okay.
$4.20 – The price of ground beef just hit a brand new record high of $4.20 a pound. Exactly 10 years ago, it was just $2.21 a pound. What do you thinkClara Peller would say about this?
Abbot Point dredge spoil dump site ‘worst possible’ for environment, documents show – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
The Queensland Government has known for more than two years that the site where it proposes to dump millions of tonnes of dredge spoil at Abbot Point was the worst of seven possible options for port expansion from an environmental point of view.
Experts working for North Queensland Bulk Ports, a government-owned corporation which operates the Abbot Point terminal, reported in September 2012 that the site west of the port where the State Government now proposes to dump the spoils offered the lowest cost option for reclamation and expansion and was nearest to the coast.
But the consultants warned: “However, the West Site is considered the least desirable from an environmental and approvals perspective as it will result in the greatest impact on the Caley Valley Wetland and Cultural Heritage values of Abbot Point”.
The reports, not previously made public and obtained under Right To Information, show experts considered the risks of expansion on the western site were so high it was in any case highly unlikely it would obtain Commonwealth approval.
Ocean Plastic Estimated at 5.25 Trillion Pieces — But Where’s the Rest? – Our World
Ocean Plastic Estimated at 5.25 Trillion Pieces — But Where’s the Rest? – Our World.
The deluge of plastic detritus — from the large to the microscopic — swirling about in our oceans weighs in at 269,000 metric tons, according to the most comprehensive research on marine plastic hot off the press yesterday. One of the researchers, Dr. Marcus Erikson, visualizes it like this: “Two liter plastic bottles stacked end-to-end forming a column to the moon and back TWICE.” That’s roughly 6 billion bottles afloat on the high seas.
But as devastating as these numbers are, Erikson says they’re way too conservative. Given that we produce 300 million tons of plastic every year and the National Academy of Sciences estimates 0.1 percent of it ends up in the ocean, he says he knows there’s more. Way more.
So exactly where is the rest?
Especially the most toxic and chemically laden fragments — microplastics — which numbered 100 times less than expected.
There are two mechanisms accelerating the marine plastic phenomenon: gyres, which pulverize plastic, and ocean currents transporting it to the ends of the earth.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Yellowknife latest city to recognize citizens’ right to live in a healthy environment | News
Yellowknife latest city to recognize citizens’ right to live in a healthy environment | News.
City joins Richmond, The Pas, Vancouver and Montreal in standing up for citizens’ right to have a say in decisions that affect the people and places they love
On December 8, Yellowknife became the fifth city in Canada to recognize its citizens’ right to live in a healthy environment, passing a municipal declaration that protects clean water, fresh air and healthy food, and gives citizens a say in decisions that affect people’s health.
The David Suzuki Foundation’s local partner in Yellowknife, Dene Nahjo, welcomed the news. “The people of the North are experiencing climate change daily and living with a mining legacy that doesn’t embody responsibility, social justice or public health,” said Dëneze Nakehk’o, spokesperson for Dene Nahjo. “To have the City of Yellowknife support a declaration for environmental rights shows bravery and leadership and sends a strong message to the North and the rest of the world that our most valuable resource is people.”
The city joins Richmond and Vancouver, B.C., The Pas, Manitoba, and Montreal, Quebec, with many more getting ready to follow suit. “Cities from coast to coast to coast are joining this movement,” said Sophika Kostyniuk, National Organizing Manager for the David Suzuki Foundation. “These cities represent almost two-and-a-half-million Canadians who now benefit from local governments that are putting the health of the people and places they love first.” Kostyniuk said thousands of Canadians are already working to grow this movement in cities and towns across Canada. “This grassroots effort shows what can happen when ordinary people take extraordinary action, and in the coming weeks and months we’ll see even more communities sign on.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Citizens Take Monitoring Into Own Hands as Eagle Ford Shale Boom Continues Undaunted | DeSmogBlog
Citizens Take Monitoring Into Own Hands as Eagle Ford Shale Boom Continues Undaunted | DeSmogBlog.
Hugh Fitzsimons lll, a buffalo rancher on the outskirts of Carrizo Springs, Texas, cautiously watches the fracking industry’s accelerating expansion. His 13,000-acre ranch is atop the southwestern part of the oil-rich Eagle Ford Shale, which stretches from Leon County in northeast Texas to Laredo, along the Mexican border.
During the last two years Fitzsimons has watched the fracking boom transform a rural locale into an industry hub. Desolate dirt roads are now packed with truck traffic, and commercial development to service the growing industry has sprung up along state highways, creating air and noise pollution.
Though Fitzsimons stands to profit from oil extraction, he has not turned a blind eye to the industry’s damaging effects on the environment. He wants to make sure the expanding industry acts responsibly and is doing his part to ensure that happens, a tall order since a state-sponsored report estimates the number of wells could grow from 8,000 to 32,000 by 2018 and industry polices itself for the most part.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
New Report Highlights Fracking’s Global Hazards | DeSmogBlog
New Report Highlights Fracking’s Global Hazards | DeSmogBlog.
A new report, issued the same day the latest round of global climate negotiations opened in Peru, highlights the fracking industry’s slow expansion into nearly every continent, drawing attention not only to the potential harm from toxic pollution, dried-up water supplies and earthquakes, but also to the threat the shale industry poses to the world’s climate.
The report, issued by Friends of the Earth Europe, focuses on the prospects for fracking in 11 countries in Africa, Asia, North and South America and Europe, warning of unique hazards in each location along with the climate change risk posed in countries where the rule of law is relatively weak.
“Around the world people and communities are already paying the price of the climate crisis with their livelihoods and lives,” said Susann Scherbarth, climate justice and energy campaigner at Friends of the Earth Europe. “Fracking will only make things worse and has no place in a clean energy future.”
The 80-page document describes plans for fracking in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest (and the deforestation that would go along with that drilling), highlights the hazards the water-intensive process poses to already-disappearing aquifers in arid regions of northern Africa, and notes that licenses for shale gas drilling have been issued in the earthquake-prone zone at the foot of the Himalaya mountains in India.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Climate response made in the USA – The Drum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Climate response made in the USA – The Drum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).
The climate talks in Peru are leading to the possibility that the post-2020 response will be “made in the USA”. Meanwhile, Australia could be doing more to help, writes Erwin Jackson.
Will the post-2020 climate change framework be “made in the USA”? This is the question many in Lima, Peru, are pondering at the end of the first week of the climate talks.
There is little doubt that US president Barack Obama has made next year’s Paris agreement the top diplomatic priority for the US, and that this has impacted on the process – both inside and outside. The US, along with Algeria, have now been confirmed as the new co-chairs that will guide the process into Paris, where the next international climate change agreement will be finalised.
Some examples of the impact of the change in posture of the US are obvious. The US-China announcement on emissions targets last month is the obvious one. This was not a one-sided deal. China takes the issue very seriously. But the agreement would not have happened if president Obama had not prioritised climate change in high level diplomatic engagement in recent times.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Environment: Increasing Waste – Crash Course Chapter 24 | Peak Prosperity
The Environment: Increasing Waste – Crash Course Chapter 24 | Peak Prosperity.
Chapter 24 of the Crash Course is now publicly available and ready for watching below.
Following up on the previous chapter focusing on human-caused resource depletion, the other disheartening part of the story of the environment concerns the things we humans put back into it, and the impact they have on the ecosystems that support all of life — ours included.
Like the economy, ecosystems are complex systems. That means that they owe their complexity and order to energy flows and, most importantly, they are inherently unpredictable. How they will respond to the change by a thousand rapid insults is unknown and literally unknowable.
Like any complex system, an ecosystem will tend to remain in a stable form until the pressures become too great and then they will suddenly shift to a different baseline and exist there for a while. That is, instead of having some magical preferred equilibrium, they have many — and some of those will be decidedly less or more awesome for humans to exist within.
If the world tips from a stable climate to a less stable one, as it has done many times in the past, then growing enough food for everyone will become difficult if not impossible.
An ocean acidified will remain that way for possibly hundreds of thousands or even millions of years. Overly-depleted cod fisheries will take many decades to recover, if and only if they are not fished in between. A species wiped out remains that way forever.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article and view the video…
Political Will Pushing Energy East Pipeline In Canada
Political Will Pushing Energy East Pipeline In Canada
Alberta Premier Jim Prentice met his Ontario peer Kathleen Wynne Wednesday as he presses for approval of TransCanada’s (NYSE, TSE:TRP) proposed Energy East pipeline, which would pass through the Central Canadian province.
After their first face-to-face meeting they sounded conciliatory, saying they consider the controversial $12 billion project as a “nation-building” exercise.
Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard released last month a list of seven conditions for the proposed pipeline, which would carry western crude to refineries located on the opposite side of the country. The most important of them is the potential impact of the pipeline on the environment.
But Wynne, reports Canadian Press, says her concerns about the pipeline’s contribution to climate change are limited to greenhouse gas emissions in Ontario and in Quebec from the pipeline project itself.
She added that the seven principles do not extend to “so-called upstream emissions resulting from getting the crude out of the ground, refining and burning it.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Ontario’s Greenbelt is under threat | – Environmental Defence
Ontario’s Greenbelt is under threat | – Environmental Defence.
Ontario’s Greenbelt protects farmland and natural areas like forests and wetlands from urban sprawl. It ensures that nature isn’t a long drive away, and protects the sources of drinking water for millions of GTA residents. And it ensures that we in the Greater Golden Horseshoe have access to fresh, local food.
But, our world renowned Greenbelt is at risk. Today, the Ontario Greenbelt Alliance and Environmental Defence jointly released a new study, Ontario’s Greenbelt at Risk, which outlines four key threats to the Greenbelt:
- Proposals for infrastructure, such as new mega-highways that would pave over prime farmland, contribute to poorer air quality, and generate more greenhouse gases;
- Sprawl developments in the Greenbelt that would destroy farmland, forest and wetlands and the animals that live there;
- An unnecessary airport in the Greenbelt that would eliminate 7,530 hectares of prime farmland and forests, isolate Rouge Park from the Oak Ridges Moraine, spark development along the boundary of the Rouge Park and contribute to climate change;
- Dumping contaminated soil, which puts water and food sources at risk
The good news is that actions can be taken to reduce each of these threats.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Environment: Depleting Resources – Crash Course Chapter 23 | Peak Prosperity
The Environment: Depleting Resources – Crash Course Chapter 23 | Peak Prosperity.
Chapter 23 of the Crash Course is now publicly available and ready for watching below.
When we wander over to the third E in this story – the Environment – we note two things: both the increasing demand of exponentially more resources being extracted from the ground and exponentially more waste being put back into various ecosystems.
Because we are trying to assess here whether we can justify ever-increasing amounts of money and debt, for now let’s just concern ourselves with the resources we take from the natural world to support our global economy.
Oil is not the only essential resource that is fast becoming more expensive to produce, harder to find, or both. In fact, we see an alarming number of examples depletion of critical resources that almost exactly mirror the oil story.
First we went after the easy and or high quality stuff, then the progressively trickier, deeper and or more dilute stuff.
The bottom line is this: we, as a species, all over the globe, have already mined the richest ores, found the easiest energy sources, and farmed the richest soils that our Environment has to offer.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article and view the video…
Eco-tourism on agenda in Tasmania as government accepts proposals for development in national parks, World Heritage Areas – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
A new environmental battle is looming in Tasmania as the state opens up untouched areas for eco-tourism.
The Hodgman Government wants tourism operators to take advantage of development opportunities inside national parks and World Heritage Areas.
It has received 37 proposals, including one from operator Ian Johnstone to build permanent hut-style accommodation along the South Coast Track bushwalking route, 110 kilometres from Hobart.
He believes he can increase the numbers walking the track by between 1000 and 1500 people each year.
Currently, to do the seven-day walk, which is known for its rugged coastline, boat crossings and pristine forest, tourists must be self sufficient and carry a heavy pack including all of their own supplies.
“People that are coming and walking in the South Coast Track, are really the young, the fit and the very strong, who are happy to carry a heavy pack which means a lot of the population really can’t experience it,” Mr Johnstone said.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Real Cost of Fracking: How America’s Shale Gas Boom Is Threatening Our Families, Pets, and Food
The Real Cost of Fracking: How America’s Shale Gas Boom Is Threatening Our Families, Pets, and Food.
The first researchers to systematically document ill health in livestock, pets, and people living near fracking drill sites were Michelle Bamberger and Robert Oswald. Bamberger, a veterinarian, and Oswald, a professor of molecular medicine at Cornell University, used a case study approach–looking at individual households–to search for possible effects (Bamberger and Oswald 2012).
Many fracking chemicals are known carcinogens, endocrine disruptors or other classes of toxins (Colborn et al. 2011). Bamberger and Oswald’s studies, carried out during the ongoing fracking boom, uncovered serious adverse effects including respiratory, reproductive, and growth-related problems in animals and a spectrum of symptoms in humans that they termed “shale gas syndrome”. Ultimately, their research led them to consider fracking’s broader implications for farming and the food system (Bamberger and Oswald 2012 and 2014).
Their new book, The Real Cost of Fracking: How America’s Shale Gas Boom Is Threatening Our Families, Pets, and Food describes the results of this research. However, it is by showing the pervasiveness of fracking’s harmful effects on the lives of the householders that Bamberger and Oswald best convey its true costs.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Waking up to the Water – An ecocentric vision of human identity in the 21st Century | The Dark Mountain Project
Life is all about information. Whether you are a plant, a tree, a chimp or a human, all living things are continually influenced by information from the past. The more useful the information we can get, the better able we are to solve our problems in the present in order to survive. Through the process of natural selection, such information has come to reside not only in the DNA of lifeforms but in some species it has also evolved to be, maintained externally in the form of culture. As a group’s knowledge and understanding of the world are handed down from generation to generation, our interactions with the world scrape away our ignorance, bit by bit, so that eventually we are better able to solve our problems, or else we and our ideas die.
However, not all ignorance gets scraped away by the cold, harsh truth of nature but is instead protected in order to continue to confer considerable power onto an individual, ideology, institution or civilisation that is built around that vision, which they therefore insist must be maintained at all costs. Although we should never underestimate the stubbornness of ignorance, history has shown us that eventually there comes a time when such powers and such visions must adapt or die as the inaccuracies of their vision lose out either to competitors whose perspective is more accurate, reliable and more useful; or they lose out at their own hand as their analysis of reality is fundamentally flawed, unreliable and less useful to solving the problems that life can present – ours is but one of many civilisations since 8000 BC that have risen and fallen by first exploiting nature and then by suffering the weaknesses that over-exploitation brings and the ensuing reduction in resilience to what may once have been minor threats that ultimately lead to collapse.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
How to lower your foodprint | Queen of Green | David Suzuki Foundation
How to lower your foodprint | Queen of Green | David Suzuki Foundation.
Your “foodprint” — the choices you make about what you eat — can make as big a difference for the environment as how you get around.
This fall, a team of Queen of Green coaches are helping a community of Canadian families go from ordinary to extraordinary when it comes to eating more sustainably. You read how they tackled waste. Prepare to be inspired as they reduce their foodprints during Module 2 (of 4)! (Go ahead, be a copycat.)
Meet Renu, Tom and son, Coen, of B.C.
Renu aims to do:
- More home cooking
- Fine-tune composting
- Grow more food
- She courageously advocated for healthier choices at her son’s daycare and tries hard to provide edibles without packaging when it’s her day to contribute.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
