Signs From Earth

Pacific Ocean La Niña drives east African drought (via @NASA_EO)

Plant growth conditions in east Africa Jan. 1-10, 2011 compared to average growth for January between 1999 and 2009. From NASA Earth Observatory, by Jesse Allen from SPOT

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=48850

NASA Earth Observatory: "East Africa is about as far from the Central Pacific Ocean as a person can get without leaving the planet. And yet, as the Pacific chills, drought grips East Africa in classic La Nina style. Because of global teleconnections, La Nina has the power to affect the weather half a world away.

"This image, from France's SPOT satellite, shows severe drought in Somalia, Kenya, and southern Ethiopia. The image is a vegetation anomaly, a measure of how well plants were growing compared to average. This image compares plant growth between January 1 and 10, 2011, compared to the average growth for January between 1999 and 2009. Widespread brown is an indication that plant growth slowed, with fewer photosynthesizing leaves than average..."

Also see: Study: More drought, food shortage risk likely in east Africa (via @Eurekalert @USGS)

http://ddimick.posterous.com/study-more-drought-food-shortage-risk-likely

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Oil breaches $101 amid Egypt turmoil (via @FT)

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/394a58d8-2d4b-11e0-9b0f-00144feab49a.html#axzz1CdnfzT1p

Financial Times Jan. 31, 2011: "Benchmark Brent crude breached $101 per barrel on Monday for the first time in more than two years as turmoil in Egypt injected supply worries into a gradually tightening oil market..."

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Fossil Future: "Our Energy Future by the Numbers" (via @techreview)

Worldwide Carbon-Dioxide Emissions by Fuel (billion metric tons) 1990-2035. More charts at link below: From DOE EIA and Technology Review

http://www.technologyreview.com/business/27017/?nlid=4061

"Statistics from the U.S. government suggest that our energy choices and level of consumption will not change much over the next few decades."

David Rotman, Technology Review, Jan. 31, 2011: "...while renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind power, receive a great deal of attention, they will remain minor contributors to our overall energy mix. Nearly all our energy is derived from fossil fuels, whether petroleum, natural gas, or coal, and that will remain true for at least the next few decades. Second, demand for energy will continue to grow, keeping prices high. ..."

See five more charts at link above...

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Pollution Atlas: World carbon emissions by country (via @guardianeco)

The Guardian DataBlog: Partial screenshot from chart of global carbon emissions by country: link to pdf of full map below 

Jan. 31, 2011: World carbon dioxide emissions data by country: China speeds ahead of the rest

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jan/31/world-carbon-dioxide-emissions-country-data-co2

From The Guardian's DataBlog, a visualization of global carbon emissions by country using latest data (1980-2009) from US DOE Energy Information Administration. 

Downloadable pdf of chart available, also source data in excel format.

US DOE EIA: International Energy Statistics

http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/IEDIndex3.cfm?tid=90&pid=44&aid=8

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Egypt and Tunisia usher in new era of global food revolutions (via @telegraph from @globalpost)

UN FAO Food Price Index through December 2010, link below

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/8291470/Egypt-and-Tunisia-usher-in-the-new-era-of-global-food-revolutions.html

"Political risk has returned with a vengeance. The first food revolutions of our Malthusian era have exposed the weak grip of authoritarian regimes in poor countries that import grain, whether in North Africa today or parts of Asia tomorrow."

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, The Telegraph, Jan. 30: "...The surge in global food prices since the summer - since Ben Bernanke signalled a fresh dollar blitz, as it happens - is not the underlying cause of Arab revolt, any more than bad harvests in 1788 were the cause of the French Revolution. 

"Yet they are the trigger, and have set off a vicious circle. Vulnerable governments are scrambling to lock up world supplies of grain while they can. Algeria bought 800,000 tonnes of wheat last week, and Indonesia has ordered 800,000 tonnes of rice, both greatly exceeding their normal pace of purchases. Saudi Arabia, Libya, and Bangladesh, are trying to secure extra grain supplies. 

"The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said its global food index has surpassed the all-time high of 2008, both in nominal and real terms. The cereals index has risen 39pc in the last year, the oil and fats index 55pc..."

Also see: The year(s) of living dangerously (via @bigthink from @LMDiplo)

http://ddimick.posterous.com/the-year-of-living-dangerously-via-bigthink-f

Also see FAO Food Price Index 

http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/FoodPricesIndex/en/

Also see: Signs from Earth Notes: Food Prices

http://ddimick.posterous.com/?sort=&search=food+prices

Also see: SignsFrom Earth Notes: Food Security

http://ddimick.posterous.com/?sort=&search=food+security

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Study: More drought, food shortage risk likely in east Africa (via @eurekalert @USGS)

Drought-tolerant maize (corn) research, Kenya, August 2010. Photo from Creative Commons by Anne Wangalachi/CIMMYT/flickr

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-01/usgs-mfd012811.php

Jan. 28, USGS PR Via Eurekalert: "The increased frequency of drought observed in eastern Africa over the last 20 years is likely to continue as long as global temperatures continue to rise, according to new research published in Climate Dynamics. (link to full study below) This poses increased risk to the estimated 17.5 million people in the Greater Horn of Africa who currently face potential food shortages..."

"..."Global temperatures are predicted to continue increasing, and we anticipate that average precipitation totals in Kenya and Ethiopia will continue decreasing or remain below the historical average," said USGS scientist Chris Funk. "The decreased rainfall in eastern Africa is most pronounced in the March to June season, when substantial rainfall usually occurs. Although drought is one reason for food shortages, it is exacerbated by stagnating agricultural development and continued population growth."

"As the globe has warmed over the last century, the Indian Ocean has warmed especially fast. The resulting warmer air and increased humidity over the Indian Ocean produce more frequent rainfall in that region. The air then rises, loses its moisture during rainfall, and then flows westward and descends over Africa, causing drought conditions in Ethiopia and Kenya...."

Study: (Open Access) Climate Dynamics: A westward extension of the warm pool intensifies the walker circulation, drying eastern Africa

http://www.springerlink.com/content/u0352236x6n868n2/

From Study Abstract: "...This trend toward drought contrasts with projections of increased rainfall in eastern Africa and more 'El Nino-like' conditions globally by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Increased Indian Ocean SSTs appear likely to continue to strongly modulate the Warm Pool circulation, reducing precipitation in eastern Africa, regardless of whether the projected trend in ENSO is realized. These results have important food security implications, informing agricultural development, environmental conservation, and water resource planning."

UC Santa Barbara PR: More frequent drought likely in East Africa

http://www.ia.ucsb.edu/pa/display.aspx?pkey=2409

Famine Early Warning Systems Network

http://www.fews.net/Pages/default.aspx

CIMMYT: Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa

http://dtma.cimmyt.org/

Change in March-June rain in Ethiopia and Kenya  from 1979-2009. From study by Park Williams and Chris Funk, link above.

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Water Worries: The Drying of the West (via @TheEconomist)

Lake Mead (Colorado River) above Hoover Dam, Dec. 31, 2010. Photo from Creative Commons by J. N. Stuart/flickr

http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/displayStory.cfm?story_id=18013810

"The Colorado River and the civilization it waters are in crisis"

The Economist, Jan. 28: "Standing on the Hoover Dam and looking upstream at Lake Mead, America's largest reservoir, the visitor notices a wide, white band ringing the cliffs. Nicknamed "the bathtub ring", this discolouration comes from minerals that were once deposited on the volcanic rock by the Colorado River and have become visible as its level has dropped. It is one sign of a water crisis that threatens America's south-west..."

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The Coal Boom: Burning Ambitions (via @TheEconomist)

Coal train, Blacksburg, Virginia, Sept. 2010. Photo from Creative Commons by Steve Tatum/flickr

"What is good news for miners is bad news for the environment"

http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/displayStory.cfm?story_id=18010727

The Economist: "In rich countries, where people worry about air quality and debate ways of pricing carbon emissions, coal is deeply unfashionable. Elsewhere demand for the dirty rocks has never been stronger. The International Energy Agency (IEA) reckons world consumption will increase by a fifth over the next 25 years, assuming governments stick to their current climate-change policies. A new age of coal is upon us...."

IEA: International Energy Agency: World Energy Outlook 2010

http://www.iea.org/weo/index.asp

International Energy Outlook 2010 Highlights from US Dept. of Energy EIA (Note: is not IEA)

http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/highlights.html

Graph below from DOE EIA (link above) World coal consumption by region to 2035

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'A History of the Future': Photographing climate change (via @PBSNeedToKnow)

Drought and fires: Umatilla National Forest, Washington State, 2006. By Susannah Sayler, Used with permission.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/environment/a-history-of-the-future-capturing-the-world-to-come/6466/

PBS Need to Know: Jack A. Light: "Five years ago, photographer Susannah Sayler set out to artistically render the future. Specifically, the environmental warnings against what could become our future...

"...Each of the landscapes in the series' photos has been affected, or will soon be affected, by climate change...

"..."A History of the Future" is part of a larger artistic collection, the Canary Project. Sawyer founded the project in 2005 with her husband, Edward Morris, to, in her words, "produce artwork and other media on the subject of climate change to raise public awareness and also energize commitment to solutions..."

Slide Show: PBS Need to Know: Photographing the world to come

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/environment/slideshow-photographing-the-world-to-come/6600/

The Canary Project: A History of the Future

http://canary-project.org/2010/07/a-history-of-the-future/

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Living in the Anthropocene (via @yalee360)

Bolivian forest, clear-cut, and planted. 2009. Photo from Creative Commons by Sam Beebe/Ecotrust/flickr

Living in the Anthropocene: Toward a New Global Ethos: Yale Environment 360

http://e360.yale.edu/feature/living_in_the_anthropocene_toward_a_new_global_ethos_/2363/

Paul J. Crutzen and Christian Schwägerl: "It's a pity we're still officially living in an age called the Holocene. The Anthropocene -- human dominance of biological, chemical and geological processes on Earth -- is already an undeniable reality. Evidence is mounting that the name change suggested by one of us more than ten years ago is overdue. It may still take some time for the scientific body in charge of naming big stretches of time in Earth's history, the International Commission on Stratigraphy, to make up its mind about this name change. But that shouldn't stop us from seeing and learning what it means to live in this new Anthropocene epoch, on a planet that is being anthroposized at high speed..."

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also see: Signs From Earth Notes: Anthropocene

http://ddimick.posterous.com/?sort=&search=anthropocene

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Study: Rethinking Cities Is Key to Climate Change (via @scienceinsider)

Buildings in Toronto, 2009. Photo from Creative Commons by paul(dex)/flickr

http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/01/study-says-rethinking-cities-is.html?ref=ra

Sid Perkins, Science Insider, Jan. 25:  "Cities generate most of the world's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. So changing their configuration and altering the lifestyles of urban dwellers can have a major impact on mitigating those emissions and reducing their contribution to global warming, according to a new study led by analysts at the World Bank in Washington, D.C.

"Today's urban residents make up half of the world's population but account for 71% of energy-related greenhouse gas emissions. That fraction is expected to rise to 76% by 2030. ..."

Environment and Urbanization: Cities and greenhouse gas emissions:  moving forward

http://eau.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/01/08/0956247810392270.full.pdf+html

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also see: MIT Press: World Policy Journal: 2010-2011 Winter issue, "Megalopolis: The City of the 21st Century. 

"Explores the nature of the new city, its people, their hopes, fears and challenges as the world becomes increasingly urbanized."

All articles in this Megalopolis issue are full text free access PDF

http://www.mitpressjournals.org/toc/wopj/27/4

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Return to Chernobyl (via @gerdludwig @kickstarter)

The Long Shadow of Chernobyl – A Long-Term Project By Gerd Ludwig

http://www.longshadowofchernobyl.com/

My friend and photographer Gerd Ludwig is seeking financial support (at any level) from concerned individuals so he can return to Chernobyl, Ukraine in April on the 25th anniversary of the nuclear power plant explosion there. 

A renowned photojournalist and documentary photographer of environmental and political trends, Gerd has previously endured significant personal risk to document the damaged and vanished human culture there, to show how the region has profoundly changed in the decades since the nuclear power plant explosion on April 26, 1986 spread nuclear fallout across Europe and the (then) western Soviet Union.

http://www.gerdludwig.com/html/chernobyl_zone.htm

Gerd and I have worked together on many National Geographic projects over the years, the first being a story in the early 1990s on the reunification of Germany after the fall of "The Wall." Among many projects documenting social change in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, Gerd has also spent years photographing pollution there. 

Gerd wants to continue telling the story of the people and region of Chernobyl, and he has engaged the services of crowd-source funding website Kickstarter.com. If you have an Amazon account your contribution can be handled by them. Contributions of any amount can help, even a dollar. I contributed, and am one of more than 230 people so far who have.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gerdludwig/the-long-shadow-of-chernobyl

Gerd is keeping alive the traditions of "The Concerned Photographer," a phrase coined by Cornell Capa (founder of the International Center of Photography) to describe photographers who are using their work to contribute to humanity's well-being.

Concerned photographers are doing more than reporting on the world. They are creating photography to educate and change the world.

International Center of Photography: Cornell Capa

http://emuseum.icp.org/view/people/asitem/id/153

http://www.icp.org/museum/exhibitions/cornell-capa-concerned-photographer

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An Under-Reported War Over Water (via @PDNonline from @mediastorm @yalee360)

http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/features/An-Under-Reported-Wa-1447.shtml

David Walker, PDN Jan. 26: "Almost unnoticed by the mainstream media, the political consequences of global climate change are now playing out in East Africa. Tribes that have co-existed peacefully for centuries along the border between Kenya and Ethiopia are going to war over diminishing water resources as their livestock dies, their crops fail, and they starve.

"The unfolding tragedy is the subject of photographer Evan Abramson's recent project called "When the Water Ends: Africa's Climate Conflicts." Earlier this year, he spent six weeks on a self-funded trip around the region, documenting the causes and consequences of the conflicts in photos and video. MediaStorm turned it into a 16-minute video production, which was published by Yale Environment 360, the online publication of Yale University's School of Forestry & Environmental Studies..."

Also see: "When the Water Ends: Africa's Climate Conflicts" (via @mediastorm @yalee360)

http://ddimick.posterous.com/when-the-water-ends-africas-climate-conflicts

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The year of living dangerously (via @bigthink from @LMDiplo)

Jan 7, 2011. Riots in Algiers over high food prices and unemployment. Photo from Creative Commons by magharebia/flickr

http://mondediplo.com/openpage/the-year-of-living-dangerously

"Rising commodity prices and extreme weather events threaten global stability"

Le Monde Diplomatique, Jan. 25, Michael Klare: "...the prices of basic food staples are already approaching or exceeding their 2008 peaks, that year when deadly riots erupted in dozens of countries around the world.

"It's not surprising then that food and energy experts are beginning to warn that 2011 could be the year of living dangerously -- and so could 2012, 2013, and on into the future. Add to the soaring cost of the grains that keep so many impoverished people alive a comparable rise in oil prices -- again nearing levels not seen since the peak months of 2008 -- and you can already hear the first rumblings about the tenuous economic recovery being in danger of imminent collapse. Think of those rising energy prices as adding further fuel to global discontent..."

Via: BigThink Idea Feed: Expect Global Chaos

http://bigthink.com/idea_feed_items/4526

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Research: Rogue wandering storm flooded Pakistan (via @eurekalert)

Flooded road in Muzaffargarrh district near central Pakistan in summer of 2010. Photo by World Vision.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-01/uow-rss012411.php

"Last summer's disastrous and deadly Pakistan floods were caused by a rogue weather system that wandered hundreds of miles farther west than is normal for such systems, new research shows."

Lead Researcher Robert Houze, University of Washington

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/~houze/

Study: Anomalous events leading to the summer 2010 floods in Pakistan

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/MG/mg_publist.html#2011

Houze, R. A., Jr., K. L. Rasmussen, S. Medina, S. R. Brodzik, and U. Romatschke, 2011: Anomalous atmospheric events leading to the Summer 2010 floods in Pakistan. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., accepted.

"The development of a highly anomalous pressure pattern brought rainstorms of a type that normally occur in the region of Bangladesh into the arid mountainous region of Pakistan."

Link to PDF of Submitted Study: http://www.atmos.washington.edu/MG/PDFs/BAMS11_Houzeetal_PakistanREVISED.pdf

Indus River Valley in Pakistan on July 19 and Sept. 7, 2010. Photos from Creative Commons by NASA Goddard Photo and Video/flickr.

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