Environment

• Monday, November 16th 2009 - 16:14 UTC

  Chavez ready to bombard clouds, with Cuban help, to force rainfall

  

  Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez announced he will begin bombarding not Colombia, but the clouds so as to trigger much needed precipitations to help fill up dams and reservoirs, at record low levels, and which have forced water and power rationing.

• Saturday, November 14th 2009 - 05:41 UTC

  “Spiderman” caught red-handed in Rio do Janeiro airport

  

  Spiderman exists and he was caught at the Brazilian city of Rio do Janeiro. A British tourist was detained in the city’s international airport when he was discovered trying to carry overseas a thousand live spiders in his luggage, according to the local police.

• Saturday, November 14th 2009 - 05:31 UTC

  Chilean Congress votes to create an Environmental Ministry

  

  Chile’s Senate voted early this week to create an Environmental Ministry, a milestone in Chilean environmental policy. The bill, first introduced in 2008, has been subject to considerable controversy from both supporters and opponents.

• Friday, November 13th 2009 - 15:06 UTC

  Greenland loosing mass faster than anticipated

  

  The Greenland ice sheet is losing mass faster than first thought, contributing to an increasing rate of sea level rise, according to a Bristol University scientist.

• Friday, November 13th 2009 - 15:01 UTC

  Huge iceberg spotted floating towards New Zealand

  

  A giant iceberg twice as long as a US Navy nuclear powered aircraft carrier has been spotted floating towards New Zealand.

• Friday, November 13th 2009 - 01:01 UTC

  Five-day ozone UV radiation alert in Punta Arenas

  

  The Ozone Laboratory from the University of Magallanes in Punta Arenas, extreme south of Chile has been recording the highest ultra violet indexes of the season and warned this week about exposure to sun light.

• Wednesday, November 11th 2009 - 10:55 UTC

  IEA forecasts 40% energy demand growth by 2030; mostly fossil fuels

  

  World global demand for energy which has fallen in 2009 because of the recession is forecasted to soar 40% by 2030 and the Copenhagen summit next month will be “crucial” to design an energy sustainable future according to the “World Energy Outlook 2009” released in London by the International Energy Agency.

• Wednesday, November 11th 2009 - 10:29 UTC

  Fighting to get Atlantic albatrosses off the hook

  

  As scientists gather in Recife, Brazil, to agree on quotas for the Atlantic and Mediterranean stocks of tuna and swordfish in the latest round of fisheries talks, the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) and BirdLife International are reminding delegates that at least 37 species of seabirds are at risk from these fisheries.

• Wednesday, November 11th 2009 - 04:26 UTC

  UK proposal turns south of South Orkney Islands a Marine Protected Area

  

  The British Government announced on Tuesday an ambitious plan at enhancing environmental protection of the world’s oceans and the Antarctic and including the designation of the world first “high seas” marine protected area south of the South Orkney Islands (once a Falklands dependency).

• Tuesday, November 10th 2009 - 11:37 UTC

  Phytoplankton flourishes in Antarctic open areas of water where ice retreated

  

  Large blooms of tiny marine plants called phytoplankton are flourishing in areas of open water left exposed by the recent and rapid melting of ice shelves and glaciers around the Antarctic Peninsula.