Month: April 2014

  • Wild Bees Improve Farm Revenues by Boosting Crop Yields

    Investing in habitat that attracts and supports wild bees in farms is not only an effective approach to helping enhance crop pollination, but it can also pay for itself in four years or less, according to Michigan State University research. The paper, published in the current issue of the Journal of Applied Ecology, gives farmers…

  • Filipino vulnerability

    Climate change has been a constant reality for many Filipinos, with impacts ranging from extreme weather events to periodic droughts and food scarcity. The most affected populations are coastal residents and rural communities that lack proper disaster preparedness.

  • H&M, Zara commit to cutting rainforest destruction out of clothing production

    H&M and Zara/Inditex, two of the world’s largest clothing companies, today pledged to eliminate old-growth forest destruction from their products. The commitment lends support to a new front on efforts to cut deforestation from supply chains of global brands.

  • Tropical Pacific Ocean Acidification Occurring Much Faster Than Expected, NOAA Finds

    Change is taking place in the tropical Pacific Ocean, where NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) researchers have found that carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations have increased as much as 65 percent faster than atmospheric CO2 since 1998. Rising CO2 concentrations of this magnitude indicate that tropical Pacific waters are acidifying as fast as ocean waters…

  • Crib mattresses expose infants to harmful emissions

    University of Texas at Austin’s Cockrell School of Engineering has found that crib mattresses expose sleeping infants to high levels of chemical emissions. Specifically, the team analyzed the foam padding from crib mattresses and found that the mattresses release significant amounts of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) which are potentially harmful chemicals found in many household…

  • American’s energy usage jumps in 2013

    Despite many individual efforts to decrease energy usage for 2013 increased by 2.3 Quadrillion thermal units over the previous year. These statistics have been monitored and presented by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in the most recent energy flow charts measuring renewable, fossil and even nuclear energy.