Ecology
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China Joins World Green Building Council Community
China’s Green Building Council has officially partnered with the World Green Building Council in a major boost to international efforts to curb the environmental impact of the building and construction sectors, the two organisations announced yesterday. The partnership was hailed…
EPA Moves to Relax US Vehicle Emission Standards
Scott Pruitt, the head of the US Environment Protection Agency (EPA), has revealed plans to roll back emissions standards for vehicles in a move that could impact the country’s transport emissions for decades to come. In a statement released yesterday…
Half a Degree of Warming Makes a Big Difference to Global Food Security, Study Finds
A study published Monday indicates that it makes a big difference to global food security whether signatories to the Paris agreement are able to keep global temperature to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, or allow it to rise a full two…
Melting Permafrost Emits More Methane Than Scientists Thought
Methane emissions are the source of the greenhouse gas which, after carbon dioxide, probably causes climatologists more sleepless nights than any of the other gases. And now it appears they have quite a lot more to bother them than they…
World’s Largest Desert Growing Even Larger, Partly Due to Climate Change
The Sahara Desert—which takes up about 3.6 million square miles of northern Africa—is growing ever larger, signaling daunting news for people living in the Sahel border region who stand to lose valuable arable land to the expanding desert. The boundaries…
How Smartphones Are Heating Up the Planet
When we think about climate change, the main sources of carbon emissions that come to mind for most of us are heavy industries like petroleum, mining and transportation. Rarely do we point the finger at computer technologies. In fact, many…
Coffee’s Environmental Footprint Should Be Harder to Swallow Than Dubious Cancer Claims
Coffee is not only my favorite drink, it’s a necessity (I get headaches from caffeine withdrawal). Even after a California judge decided this week that coffee should come with a cancer warning, my immediate response was to take another sip.…