Welcome ! As a young French Marketing professional with a Master's in International Management I have been selecting since January 2007 the latest headlines and best researches on sustainable development, climate change, cleantech and the world energy sector. Sounds great ? Don't hesitate to subscribe now !
To Reuters : ” An Ecuadorean appeals court on Tuesday upheld a ruling that Chevron Corp should pay $18 billion in damages to plaintiffs who accused the U.S. oil giant of polluting the Amazon jungle and damaging their health. “
” A judge ordered Chevron to pay $8.6 billion in environmental damages last February, but the amount was more than doubled to about $18 billion because Chevron failed to make a public apology as required by the original ruling. “
This brings further development to the story I ran in 2010 where I noted that during three decades Texaco operated hundreds of oil wells without taking any notice of environmental issues. Continue »
I noted last year that Amazon deforestation was at its lowest. Well it decreased again. To Grist : ” a study on deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon found that the number of square kilometers disappearing each year has hit a record low. “
However, these good news might be only temporary. Originally Grist was mentioning a vote that was due to weaken the local forest code and thus, increase deforestation.
Luckily, this vote has been postponed until March 2012 as the WWF noted today on its blog. We gotta campaign to keep the current forest code and protect our rainforests !
Yes, you read that right : twelve (12!) billion trees have been planted within the UNEP Billion Tree Campaign. The landmark was reached in November in Kenya. (Was it an homage to Wangari Maathai ?) To the official website :
” China is the leading participating country, having planted a total of 2.8 billion trees under the campaign. India is currently in second place with 2.1 billion trees, followed by Ethiopia, Mexico and Turkey. “
I am starting to wonder how all these trees will impact climate change ? In any case, their effect can’t be negative. Now, let’s plant even more trees. The campaign is willing to reach 14 billion !
To the WWF : “ It’s possible to reduce deforestation to near zero by 2020, but delaying action to save forests by even a decade means double the area of forests lost by 2030 “
” The report finds that reducing deforestation to near zero would also bring global emissions from forest destruction close to zero, but delaying this reduction until 2030 would mean sacrificing 69 million hectares of forest worldwide. “
Such a delay would bring an additional 24 gigatons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. In comparison, 33 gigatons of this gas were released in 2010 alone worldwide… Continue »
To TreeHugger : ” Last year, the Amazon rainforest experienced the worst drought on record, reducing normally flowing rivers to sun-baked stretches of dried mud and pushing the fragile ecosystem to the brink. “
” (…) As a result of 2010′s Amazon drought, experts say, some 1.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide was released into the atmosphere — more than is produced by India’s entire population in a year. “
The more we put greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, the more our Planet answers back and carbon reserves like the Russian permafrost or the Amazon Rainforest start emitting even more… Continue »
You might not have read this name before, and this despite the six times it has been featured on my blog but Wangari Maathai – who died on Sunday at the age of 71 – was a famous environmentalist, well-known for her Green Belt Movement.
This is also why she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004 and why she was considered by many a role model. I personally quickly got to know her tremendous work on planting trees and empowering women in her home country, Kenya.
The environmental cause has lost one of its most important leaders. Similarly, the African continent has lost one of its best spokesperson, but I am sure many others will step up to continue her causes. Continue »
To Sustainablog : ” It turns out we’ve been underestimating the benefits created by forests in the last case: a new study published in Science shows that “Forests play an even greater role in Earth’s climate system than previously known.”
” According to an AP report on the study, “Wooded areas across the planet soak up fully a third of the fossil fuels released into the atmosphere each year, some 2.4 billion [tons] of carbon…”
” Reforested land soaks up an additional 1.6 tons. But, of course, deforestation is still a massive trend, and it costs us 2.9 billion tons of carbon emissions every year. ” Continue »
While browsing old articles on Sustainablog, I found one that I particularly liked on successful huge reforestation projects. I learned many cool things and thought that was well worth a post.
” Governments, NGOs, and even for-profit companies recognize the environmental and economic losses caused by deforestation, and are working to restore the health of these important ecosystems.”
This reminds me of an old post I published in 2009 about afforestation projects. Meanwhile, the Billion Tree Campaign is nearing 12 billion planted trees. This is absolutely stunning ! Continue »
According to Terra Daily : ” Europe’s forests have expanded over the past 20 years and are thus absorbing more carbon dioxide, a report published in Oslo Tuesday showed, offering some good news in the battle to limit climate change. ”
” According to the report published during a ministerial conference on the protection of Europe’s forests, the continent, including Russian territory, today counts 1.02 billion hectares of forest, accounting for about a quarter of the world’s woods. ”
“Over the last 20 years, the forest area has expanded in all European regions and has gained 0.8 million hectares each year,” reads the report, entitled “State of Europe’s Forests 2011″. Continue »
I generally try to stick to current topics and news but couldn’t blog about this year’s World Environment Day, which took place on Sunday. This year the UNEP wanted to emphasize the importance of forests.
As I read on the UNEP Facebook page : “The theme of World Environment Day this year, “Forests: Nature at Your Service”, emphasizes the multi-trillion dollar value of ecosystems to society – especially the poor.”
The host country for this year was India. It was the occasion for the nation to organize a week full of various events to raise awareness on this vital topic.
