Environmental News

Using weather radar for meteorite detection and recovery is a thing. I did not know that.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1945-5100.2010.01115.x

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We are told that earth acquires about 40,000 tons of iron (plus minor others) in this way. Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions blow of some of the highest atmospheric level, but I have not seen that estimated. But these processes describe mass balance of planet. Until some rocketeer sends up really heavy stuff.

 

Politician Scott Pio of Virginia suggested taming sea-level rise by removing (all) ships from the sea:

Politician Floats Removing Boats To Lower Rising Sea Levels. Would It Work? | IFLScience

XKCD comic boss calculated 6 microns of sea level result from water displacement by 'the fleet'. It's worth knowing such things. This treatment does not emphasize goods and services provided by sea faring, including a large fraction of human nutrition, almost all international shipping. And who can forget all the navies sailing around for surely important purposes? Cruise ships and oceanographic research. Leaving this list incomplete, but dang, there are a lot of things packed into those 6 microns..

 

A container cargo ship is burning off the cost near Victoria British Colombia. Could be 'meh' in terms of environmental news? But the fire started in two containers of Potassium amylxanthate. So, environmental chemistry:

This stuff is used to separate metal ore goodies from sulfides. Both copper and nickel avidly form sulfide ores. Since both metals are important to our electro-economy (and stainless steel production), I imagine a lot of this stuff gets made and shipped around.

It ain't rocket fuel, but obviously it burns pretty good once it gets going. No idea what 'lit the match'. No idea either how much potassi-whatchamacallit is moving around. That's the sort of thing one finds out by buying a $5000-dollar 'industry report'.

 

Title:
Recent increases in tropical cyclone precipitation extremes over the US east coast
Link:
Recent increases in tropical cyclone precipitation extremes over the US east coast | PNAS

My summary - 300 years of tree rings from N and S Carolina. More late-season wood forms in years with big rain, which more or less relates to tropical cyclones. Study measures tree-ring widths, compares those with rain since 1950, and concludes what the title says. Not so many tree that old survive in study area, but, OK, yeah.

 

@fuzzy1 apparently means 57 tons of that particular chemical. Much more than 57 tons overall

British Columbia: Fire blazes cargo ship containers - CNN

Hosing down that chemical on fire would release sulfuric acid.

Good thing if most or all of other containers can be delivered intact.

942 millibars is pretty frisky.

@vvillovv , see
https://www.windy.com/?49.450,-127.090,5

 

If one agrees with UNDP (and others) that fossil-fuel subsidies exceed $400 billion per year, then UNDP would like to use that money differently:

For every dollar pledged to tackle climate crisis for world’s poor, four dollars are spent on fossil fuel subsidies that keep the climate crisis alive according to new UNDP research | United Nations Development Programme

Others, to be sure, do not agree with that count.

 

Some well-protected forests are carbon sources, not sinks:

10 UNESCO World Heritage Forests Now Emit Carbon Dioxide

The gizmodo title is more angry than it really needs to be, but that's click world for ya. You could go upstream instead:

https://whc.unesco.org/en/news/2344/

 

"a brain barely bigger than a poppy-seed"

Just in time for Halloween, a study on brainpower in small hunting spiders:

Spiders are much smarter than you think | Ars Technica

If you do not like big pictures of them, do not click link above.

Knowable magazine presents accessible summaries from some articles published by the library-shelf-crushing Annual Reviews of X series, where X is pretty much anything at all. You could do worse in terms of reading materials

 

International Energy Agency suggest path for rapid increase of electric vehicles:

Global electric car sales set for further strong growth after 40% rise in 2020 - News - IEA

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David Attenborough speaks at COP26 opening ceremony

David Attenborough Hits The Nail On The Head In COP26 Opening Speech | IFLScience

"If, working apart, we are a force powerful enough to destabilize the planet, then surely working together we are a force powerful enough to save it."

 

Oh, the bees:

Researchers must assume responsibility for ha | EurekAlert!

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Oh, the comets:

Vast patches of glassy rock in Chilean desert | EurekAlert!

There also was recent talk about Sodom (or was it Gomorrah?) having an high-energy visit, way back when. One might wonder how much 'Deity did that' calls to still incompletely known astrophysics.