deforestation
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Amazon deforestation decreasing … but not for long
Despite reports of localized deforestation and violence against rainforest activists, a study on deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon found that the number of square kilometers disappearing each year has hit a record low. But politics has a way of screwing up progress like this, and Brazilian politicians are voting today to weaken the forest code […]
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Upcoming Lorax movie to insult all that is good, holy
Like millions of other parents, I’m fond of reading my kids books by Theodor Seuss Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss. Many of them are just fun and silly, a lesson in the delights of language, but quite a few have serious moral content, from The Sneetches to Horton Hatches the Egg to How the Grinch Stole […]
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Breaking: Obama pushes huge free trade deals to Wednesday vote
If you thought President Obama’s expressions of sympathy for the Occupy Wall Street movement meant he was suddenly going to stand up for “the 99 percent” and their planet, think again. Obama has just submitted to Congress the Chamber of Commerce-backed Colombia, Panama, and Korea Free Trade Agreements, which are opposed by pretty much every […]
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Will new LEED standards allow for clearcut timber?
Environmentalists say that proposed changes to LEED green building standards will undercut forest protection.
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Graphic: The sad state of American forests
The New York Times has an interactive infographic about the state of forests worldwide. Here's North America. The orange area has been decimated by the mountain pine beetle — warmer winters mean the beetles live longer and simultaneously make the trees more vulnerable. And the bright red spots lost between 20 and 88 percent of their […]
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Dying to save the rainforest
At the end of May, José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva and his wife, Mario do Espírito Santo, were killed. Both lived in Brazil's Amazon rainforest and had fought back against loggers illegally harvesting wood. Da Silva had expected death for a long time, but said he wouldn’t let that stop him: “[M]y fear does not silence me. As long as I have the strength to walk I will denounce all of those who damage the forest."
That same week, another activist, Adelino Ramos, was shot and killed. The week after that, an activist identified only as Marcos was shot. When witnesses tried to take him to the hospital, gunmen stopped them on the way and killed the wounded man. -
New NASA map shows how much carbon is stored in global forests
NASA has just released a new map which shows the carbon stored in the forests around the world. While it doesn’t show us exactly which forests are at risk of deforestation – thus turning the current stored carbon into carbon pollution that causes global warming – it does provide us with a visual of what […]
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Critical List: Bike to work today; Amazon deforestation rate rose this year
It's Bike to Work day. Now all you bike commuters know how secretaries feel on Administrative Professionals Day: “One DAY? I’ve been doing this day in and day out all year!” The rate of Amazon deforestation has been declining in recent years; this year, it climbed again. The Brazilian government is — rightly — freaking […]
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Girl Scouts censor Facebook criticism of palm oil in cookies
Critter-killing cookies?Photo: Laura TaylorLooking for a lesson of how not to respond to green consumer demand in the internet age? Check out Girl Scouts USA. The Scouts’ CEO Kathy Cloninger has for several years rebuffed polite requests from individual scouts, major environmental organizations, and others that they make their famous Girl Scout cookies rainforest friendly. […]
