moonbuggy

`Measurements of CO2 in the atmosphere have been continuous for almost 50 years at Mauna Loa Observatory, 12,000ft up a mountain in Hawaii, regarded as far enough away from any carbon dioxide source to be a reliable measuring point.

In recent decades CO2 increased on average by 1.5 parts per million (ppm) a year because of the amount of oil, coal and gas burnt, but has now jumped to more than 2 ppm in 2002 and 2003.’

`Saving Energy Without Derision (5 mb PDF) is a new (and free) e-book by former Sandia National Laboratories senior scientist Dr. Alan P. Zelicoff. This book is intended to be a real-world, no-nonsense, thoroughly documented collection of easy-to-implement recommendations to help the average thoughtful person to pick the ‘low-hanging fruit’ of conservation and renewable energy.’

This looks interesting but it’s offline at the moment.

`Organic arsenic compounds have been detected in rice harvested at farms in Kamisu, Ibaraki Prefecture, where the Imperial Japanese Army dumped chemical weapons, the Environment Ministry said Thursday.

Diphenylarsine, found in the rice, is contained in sneezing gas, which was apparently abandoned by the Imperial army during World War II.’

`Hundreds of angry farmers seized Guatemala’s largest hydroelectric dam Tuesday, threatening to shut off power to large parts of the country unless the government agrees to return nearby lands to them. [..]

The takeover of the plant, which supplies about 60 percent of the country’s electricity, comes on the eve of a deadline set six months ago by various peasant groups for the solution of the problem.’

`[..] clean, green biodegradable plastic bags made from animal excrement or food waste could replace traditional plastic at Australian supermarket checkouts [..]

Scientists with the Sydney-based Environmental Biotechnology Co-Operative Research Centre happened on a technique for turning organic waste into a green alternative to plastic bags quite by accident, the company’s executive director, David Garman said.’