Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Northeast Greenland Begins Ominous Collapse — Giant Zachariae Isstrom Most Recent to Destabilize

robertscribbler : "In total, more than 4.5 billion tons of ice is now estimated to be flooding out from this glacier and into the ocean each year. That’s a mountain of ice about 4.5 cubic kilometers in size hitting the world’s waters from just this single glacier every time the Earth completes one circuit around the sun. In other words, Greenland just opened a new floodgate to the North Atlantic. Researchers publishing the study estimate that it will take between 20 and 30 years for the glacier to melt back to an underwater ridge line that should somewhat slow its melt. But the real news here is that a human-forced warming of the globe has set a monstrous pile of ice, once thought stable, into a motion that will result in yet more global sea level rise."

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Transporte público gratuito acaba com isolamento de residentes

Visão: "O Azulinho serve as povoações de Alcântara, em Lisboa, que não tinham acesso a transportes públicos. Os idosos da freguesia são os principais beneficiados"

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Ban Private Cars in London | Reclaim the streets for people who cycle and walk

link : "Private cars are not only unsustainable in terms of space , congestion and pollution but restrict the free movement of those wanting to use cleaner, healthier and kinder means of transport. Pollution is killing 9,400 per year, inactivity kills 1 in 6 and 1 in 20 has diabetes. It is vital that we re-allocate road space to active travel to address these public health crises."

Sunday, December 6, 2015

#Autosprawl eating up 73 hectares a day in Germany

Resilience: "In Germany alone urban sprawl gobbles up 73 hectares every day, much of it due to traffic. In 2013, the total area consumed for traffic had already reached 224 m2 per person which, compared to the 46 m2 for housing, is quite a lot. Globally there is an increasing competition on land and soil between industrial infrastructure sprawl including traffic, food production, climate-relevant forests, energy plants and natural habitats. The projected growth of car production and usage would take this competition to an unprecedented level with severe consequences e.g. for food production. Not to mention the gigantic new infrastructures and masses of natural resources and land that would be required to produce, place and host the renewable energy facilities for powering such global electric car-fleets. Finally, renewable energies are end-products of highly industrialized and CO2-intensive processes and far from being unlimited. This prospect is already frightening enough; what if a large percentage of this car-invasion were still powered by petrol or, just as bad, biofuels?"

Saturday, December 5, 2015

Portugal moves to halt privatisation of public transport

The Economic Times: "LISBON: Portugal's new left-wing, anti-austerity government announced late Friday it was moving to halt the privatisation of transport systems in Lisbon and Porto, a measure introduced by its right-wing predecessor. "

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Scam for #COP21: carbon trading with forest sequestration. Already proven not to work. But can be profitable.

REDD-Monitor : "The word “oil” does not appear in the draft text. Nor does “coal”. Fossil fuels don’t get a mention. Meanwhile “forest” appears 25 times, and “deforestation” 3 times. REDD gets 19 mentions."