the location and other related information you 'll find there itself
the event is about climate change and is done in collaboration with international day for climate change.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
international day for climate action
i have organised an event on 24 october in sonepat at town park. the details you can find on this link http://www.350.org/map#/map/29.046565622728846/78.33251953125/7
Monday, October 19, 2009
Dinosaurs illfated
India Asteroid Killed Dinosaurs, Made Largest Crater?
October 16, 2009
The dinosaurs' demise may have been due to an asteroid double-whammy—two giant space rocks that struck near Mexico and India a few hundred thousand years apart, scientists say.
For decades one of the more popular theories for what killed the dinosaurs has focused on a single asteroid impact 65 million years ago.
SHARE
RELATED
A six-mile-wide (ten-kilometer-wide) asteroid is thought to have carved out the Chicxulub crater off Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula, triggering worldwide climate changes that led to the mass extinction.
But the controversial new theory says the dinosaurs were actually finished off by another 25-mile-wide (40-kilometer-wide) asteroid. That space rock slammed into the planet off the western coast of India about 300,000 years after Chicxulub, experts say.
"The dinosaurs were really unlucky," said study co-author Sankar Chatterjee, a paleontologist at Texas Tech University in Lubbock.
Chatterjee thinks this second asteroid impact created a 300-mile-wide (500-kilometer-wide) depression on the Indian Ocean seafloor, which his team began exploring in 1996.
His team has dubbed this depression the Shiva crater, after the Hindu god of destruction and renewal.
"If we are correct," Chatterjee said, "this is the largest crater known on Earth."
Dinosaur-Killer Asteroid Boosted Volcanoes?
The Shiva asteroid impact was powerful enough to vaporize Earth's crust where it struck, allowing the much hotter mantle to well up and create the crater's tall, jagged rim, Chatterjee estimates.
What's more, his team thinks the impact caused a piece of the Indian subcontinent to break off and drift toward Africa, creating what are now the Seychelles islands (see map).
The Shiva impact may also have enhanced volcanic eruptions that were already occurring in what is now western India, Chatterjee added.
Some scientists have speculated that the noxious gases released by the Indian volcanoes, called the Deccan Traps, were crucial factors in the dinosaurs' extinction.
(Related: "'Dinosaur Killer' Asteroid Only One Part of New Quadruple-Whammy Theory.")
"It's very tempting to think that the impact actually triggered the volcanism," Chatterjee said.
"But that may not be true. It looks like the volcanism was already happening, and the [Shiva] impact just made it worse."
Arctic ice melt
This past spring scientists had taken measurements along a 280-mile (450-kilometer) route across the northern part of the Beaufort Sea (map). Most of the ice, they found, was young and thin.
"With a larger part of the region now first-year ice, it is clearly more vulnerable," expedition leader and sea-ice expert Peter Wadhams, og the University of Cambridge in England, said in a statement.
(Also see "Stormier Arctic Predicted as Ice Melts.")
Young Arctic Ice Vulnerable
The Arctic Ocean ice cover last spring was 6 feet (1.8 meters) thick, on average, indicating that it was only about a year old, the explorers said. More durable, multi-year ice, by contrast, is about nine feet (three meters) thick, according to NASA.
This relative thinness is an indication of the Arctic sea ice's poor health, said Mark Serreze, an Arctic-ice expert at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, in an interview with National Geographic News.
"Simply viewed, if we start out the melt season in spring with ice that is thin, it simply doesn't take as much solar energy to melt it out than if it was thicker," he said.
(See "Shrinking Arctic Sea Ice Thinner, More Vulnerable.")
Also, wind and ocean currents can more easily break up thinner ice, which exposes even more ice to warmer water. And once ice is free floating, winds and currents can push the ice south into warmer waters outside the Arctic Circle, Serreze added.
Dueling Dates for Arctic Ice Melt
The new data, presented by the Catlin Arctic Survey and the international conservation group WWF, support the view that the Arctic will be ice free in the summer within about 20 years.
Most of the ice melt is expected to happen within the next ten years, Wadhams said in his statement.
Serreze's group in Boulder, though, is on record saying the Arctic's summer sea ice will fully melt around 2030. Other groups have put the ice-free date as late as 2100.
(Related: "Arctic Ice to Last Decades Longer Than Thought?")
Why such seemingly wild guesses?
"When we lose the ice really depends on the natural variability in the system," Serreze said.
A good example of this is the record low year of 2007. That summer saw a perfect storm of climatic conditions: warm temperatures plus wind patterns that broke apart and pushed large chunks of ice out of the Arctic. (See "Warming Oceans Contributed to Record Arctic Melt" [2007].)
The summers of 2008 and 2009 have seen some recovery of Arctic ice, though the long-term trend is still for shrinking ice, Serreze said.
Will the slow, steady trend be the norm? Or will another year like 2007 come along and wipe out the Arctic ice?
"These are the unknowns," Serreze said. "We simply don't know."
Sunday, October 18, 2009
The climate Project
The Climate Project is making a difference September 23, 2009 : 11:02 AM
So far The Climate Project has trained more than 3,000 people to deliver my slide show. A study conducted by Milepost consulting found that the presentations these dedicated volunteers are giving have made a huge impact.
For example, the report found “that those who previously did not identify as ‘environmentalists’ underwent the greatest mental shift, becoming more likely to support emissions reduction and to reduce their carbon footprint.”
I want to congratulate all of The Climate Project’s presenters. You are really making a difference.
If you want to see these incredible volunteers in action, schedule a TCP presentation in your community by clicking here. [Link]
new fuel mileage standards
New Mileage Standards September 25, 2009 : 11:22 AM
Last week the Obama administration proposed new rules that would increase the average fuel efficiency of cars and light trucks by 40%. I absolutely agree with the Alliance for Climate Protections’ CEO Maggie Fox, who stated:
"The historic proposed fuel standards announced today by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Transportation will bring us leaps and bounds closer to repowering America and ending our dependence on foreign oil. The Obama Administration’s plans will mean cleaner, more efficient vehicles that emit less pollution, get American families savings at the pump, and promote even greater breakthroughs in clean transportation technology."
maldives
Underwater Cabinet Meeting October 16, 2009 : 11:41 AM
The Maldives lie just seven feet above sea level in the Indian Ocean. Climate change and rising sea levels could cause this tiny country to disappear. This week the country's President Mohammed Nasheed plans to hold a cabinet meeting underwater to highlight the challenge his nation is facing. “At the meeting, the Cabinet plans to sign a document calling on all countries to cut down their carbon emissions ahead of the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December, where the countries will negotiate a successor to the Kyoto Protocol.”
President Nasheed has been a unique voice on the issue of climate change. He has promised to make his nation the first carbon neutral country within the next ten years and has even launched a fund to buy a new homeland if the seas rise and the Islands are submerged.
global warming
Leading by example October 17, 2009 : 2:29 PM
With little notice, President Obama has unveiled a new executive order that will reduce the carbon footprint of the federal government. According to the White House:
“The Executive Order requires Federal agencies to set a 2020 greenhouse gas emissions reduction target within 90 days; increase energy efficiency; reduce fleet petroleum consumption; conserve water; reduce waste; support sustainable communities; and leverage Federal purchasing power to promote environmentally-responsible products and technologies.”
"As the largest consumer of energy in the U.S. economy, the Federal government can and should lead by example when it comes to creating innovative ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, increase energy efficiency, conserve water, reduce waste, and use environmentally-responsible products and technologies," said President Obama. "This Executive Order builds on the momentum of the Recovery Act to help create a clean energy economy and demonstrates the Federal government's commitment, over and above what is already being done, to reducing emissions and saving money."
Monday, October 5, 2009
global warming
The Warmest Seas on Record August 4, 2009 : 2:37 PM
According to the Sydney Morning Herald: [Link]
"For as long as people have taken the temperature of the seas they have never been so warm."
"Global ocean surface temperatures for June were the highest since records began, in 1880, breaking the record set in 2005, the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration of the United States says."
"The average sea surface temperature for June, measured by satellites and buoys, was 0.59 degrees above the 20th-century average of 16.4 degrees."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
