Global Warming Bringing More Extreme Heat Waves: NWF

Temperatures are breaking records along eastern and southern portions of the U.S. and more extremely hot summer days are in store for every part of the country if global warming continues unabated says National Wildlife Federation, which just issued an update to its heat waves report. The analysis comes days after the U.S. Senate’s leadership shelved comprehensive climate and energy legislation this summer.

In 2010, New Jersey, Delaware, and North Carolina had their hottest June on record, while Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana had their second hottest June. Eight other states had Junes that ranked in the top-five hottest.
The hot conditions continued with July 2010 being among top five hottest on record for many states. As a result, more than 70 million Americans experienced extreme heat during these two months. Hundreds of daily temperature records were broken were broken across the country.
“2010 is a sample of what’s to come because global warming is bringing more frequent and severe heat waves which will seriously impact vulnerable populations,” said Dr. Amanda Staudt, climate scientist, National Wildlife Federation.

RISKS TO PEOPLE
That means air pollution in urban areas could get worse, bringing increased risk of heart attacks, strokes and asthma attacks. Children, the elderly, poor, and people of color are especially vulnerable to these effects. Public health experts are especially alarmed.
“The science confirms that the frequency and duration of heat waves has increased significantly over the last 50 years. In the United States, heat waves already kill more people during a typical year than floods, tornadoes and earthquakes combined. Given these worsening trends, taking decisive action to stop global warming becomes a medical necessity.” said Peter Wilk, MD, executive director, Physicians for Social Responsibility.
"Global warming is one of the most massive health emergencies facing humanity. Its effects are already life-threatening for people with asthma and allergies,” said Mike Tringale, vice president of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.
Top U.S. government experts have confirmed that the earth is warming NASA scientists recently stated that the average global temperature was higher over the past 12 months than during any other 12-month period in history. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has released data showing that March to June of this year have each individually been the hottest on record as well.

MULTIPLE PROBLEMS FROM HEAT
To explain the bigger picture and provide recommendations for how to cope with projected changes and how to avoid the worst impacts of global warming the 2009 report, More Extreme Heat Waves: Global Warming’s Wake-Up Call details how:
•Global warming will bring more extreme heat waves
•Urban air pollution could be exacerbated by more extreme heat
•Heat waves disproportionately impact people who are poor, elderly, children, or have asthma or heart disease, or live in big cities
•Natural habitats and agriculture are also vulnerable to heat waves
•We can reduce the severity of heat waves and their impacts on vulnerable people

ACTION NEEDED
From New York to Los Angeles the report details 30 large U.S. cities where major risk factors associated with heat-related mortality make residents especially vulnerable to heat waves.
“We need to take these trends toward more extreme heat waves into account when designing urban areas and public health programs,” said Dr. Staudt. “We can no longer plan based on the climate we used to have.”
Important steps to reduce the risks include curbing global warming pollution to minimize future extreme heat waves, making cities cooler and greener, implementing public health measures that reduce the impact of extreme heat waves, and safeguarding wildlife, fish and habitats from extreme heat.

National Wildlife Federation 8-11-2010

Marine Habitat Destruction: National Geographic

Habitat destruction occurs when the conditions necessary for plants and animals to survive are significantly compromised or eliminated. Most areas of the world's oceans are experiencing habitat loss. But coastal areas, with their closeness to human population centers, have suffered disproportionately and mainly from manmade stresses. Habitat loss here has far-reaching impacts on the entire ocean's biodiversity. These critical areas, which include estuaries, swamps, marshes, and wetlands, serve as breeding grounds or nurseries for nearly all marine species.

Causes of Ocean Habitat Loss

Humans and Mother Nature share blame in the destruction of ocean habitats, but not equally. Hurricanes and typhoons, storm surges, tsunamis and the like can cause massive, though usually temporary, disruptions in the life cycles of ocean plants and animals. Human activities, however, are significantly more impactful and persistent. Wetlands are dredged and filled in to accommodate urban, industrial, and agricultural development. Cities, factories, and farms create waste, pollution, and chemical effluent and runoff that can wreak havoc on reefs, sea grasses, birds, and fish. Inland dams decrease natural nutrient-rich runoff, cut off fish migration routes, and curb freshwater flow, increasing the salinity of coastal waters. Deforestation far from shore creates erosion, sending silt into shallow waters that can block the sunlight coral reefs need to thrive. Destructive fishing techniques like bottom trawling, dynamiting, and poisoning destroy habitats near shore as well as in the deep sea. Tourism brings millions of boaters, snorkelers, and scuba divers into direct contact with fragile wetland and reef ecosystems. Container ships and tankers can damage habitat with their hulls and anchors. Spills of crude oil and other substances kill thousands of birds and fish and leave a toxic environment that can persist for years.

Climate Change
Perhaps the most devastating of all habitat-altering agents, however, is climate change. Scientists are still coming to grips with the consequences that excessive atmospheric carbon dioxide and Earth's rapid warming are having on ecosystems. But there is ample evidence indicating that the oceans are bearing the brunt of these changes. As Earth's temperature rises, it is primarily the oceans that absorb the extra heat. Even small temperature changes can have far-reaching effects on the life cycles of marine animals from corals to whales.
In addition, warmer temperatures cause excess melting of ice caps and glaciers, raising sea levels and flooding estuaries. High levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, caused mainly by the burning of fossil fuels, are absorbed by the oceans, where the gas dissolves into carbonic acid. This elevated acidity inhibits the ability of marine animals, including many plankton organisms, to create shells, disrupting life within the very foundation of the ocean's food web. Full article click here....

Help Consumers Save Money by Saving Energy: ENN

At a time when families are struggling to pay their energy bills, leaders in the House are pushing to roll back common sense standards for residential lighting that save families money by saving energy. It’s important to remember that these standards were passed just a few years ago with overwhelming bipartisan support from 86 Senators and 314 members of the House. They were championed and co-sponsored by the former Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, and signed into law by President Bush.

Also, the standards do NOT ban incandescent bulbs. You’ll still be able to buy energy-saving halogen incandescent bulbs that look exactly the same as the ones you’re used to, and more than pay for themselves over the life of the 100 watt replacement bulb.The only difference is that your electric bills will be lower.

To save even more money, there are a wide range of new options like CFLs and LEDs. These options are 75 or 80 percent more efficient than traditional lighting, and they’ll last 10 or 25 times longer. In some cases, you might never have to replace them.

In a typical house, replacing 15 traditional bulbs with energy saving bulbs will save about $50 a year. That’s enough to run two 50 inch Energy Star plasma TVs — five hours a day, all year long. The savings get even bigger if you use only the most efficient bulbs.

From: The White House Blog, Clean Techies

Published July 13, 2011 12:46 PM

The Benefits of Vinegar

Vinegar by definition is "a sour liquid obtained by acetic fermentation of diluted alcoholic liquids and used as a condiment or preservative." The French discovered vinegar when they had found soured wine left in the barrel. Vinegar was used as a natural preservative for many, many years because it kills germs and bacteria. This wonderful germ and bacteria fighting agent also makes it a great house cleaner!
Vinegar has been valued for its healing properties for thousands of years. During that time, it has found its way from the apothecary's shelf to the cook's pot. Today it continues help regulate blood sugar levels while entertaining our taste buds with its tart flavor.
Apple cider vinegar, in particular, is very beneficial to your health. It contains vitamins C, E, A, P, B1, B2, and B6. Apple Cider vinegar also contains a slew of healthy minerals such as manganese, iron, calcium, sodium, magnesium, sulfur, copper, phosphorous, silicon, chlorine, and fluorine. Packed with all these vitamins and minerals, Apple cider vinegar could be one of the most important staples in our diets.
Apple cider vinegar helps to control blood pressure and cholesterol, diabetes, arthritis pains, yeast infections, chest congestion, sore throat, and nasal congestion. Apple cider vinegar also aids in weight loss by detoxifying the liver. Some historians suggest that the Egyptians used apple cider vinegar for weight loss.
No one is really sure how apple cider vinegar works to promote weight loss, but there is no shortage of theories. It is generally believed that the nutrients, enzymes, and organic acids in apple cider vinegar cause weight reduction by acting as an appetite suppressant, by increasing your body's metabolic rate, by reducing water retention, and by helping you maintain a feeling of well being. Recent medical research has highlighted the connection between levels of insulin and weight loss. That coupled with the fact that vinegar is known to slow the rise of blood sugar after a meal leads to the suggestion that the taking of apple cider vinegar with a meal reduces the amount of insulin required to process the meal resulting in weight loss.

Carbon dating technique to aid energy from waste

A new use for carbon dating will aid the production of energy from wood and waste, said a bio-energy group on Thursday after British regulatory approval of the new test.

Carbon dating is commonly used to estimate the age of ancient artifacts, exploiting the fact that a particular type of carbon disappears, or decays, at a fixed rate, so that the amount left behind clocks how much time has passed.
A recently adapted technique, developed by the Energy Research Center of the Netherlands, takes monthly samples of the carbon-14 in the smokestack of power plants.
It tallies that with the energy produced to estimate how much carbon dioxide in the flue gas came from burning ancient fossil fuels and how much from greener, younger fuels such as wood, crop waste and other so-called biomass.
The practice of co-firing biomass with coal is increasing as power plants try to pare carbon costs and earn green energy incentives.
"(This) is enabling easy and accurate differentiation between CO2 emissions created from fossil and biogenic, renewable fuels," said the UK's National Center for Biorenewable Energy, Fuels and Materials (NNFCC), a lobby group.
The technology is already used in Belgium and the Netherlands, the NNFCC said.
It may be a simpler way of disentangling green from coal-fired power than the alternative, which is to measure the amount of biomass and coal fuel fed into a furnace.
"Independent reports concluded that the 14C technique is based on mature and well understood technology," said Britain's energy watchdog Ofgem last Friday, explaining its approval.
"The reports also concluded that results from this technique would be at least as accurate as the existing sampling methods used."
From 2013 all fossil fuel power plants in western Europe will have to pay for every tonne of carbon dioxide emissions, under the European Union's emissions trading scheme.

Science News Daily: By Greard Wynn (July 14, 2011)

Climate Cover-Up: The Crusade to Deny Global Warming

Talk of global warming is nearly inescapable these days — but there are some who believe the concept of climate change is an elaborate hoax. Despite the input of the world’s leading climate scientists, the urgings of politicians, and the outcry of many grassroots activists, many Americans continue to ignore the warning signs of severe climate shifts. How did this happen? Climate Cover-up seeks to answer this question, describing the pollsters and public faces who have crafted careful language to refute the findings of environmental scientists. Exploring the PR techniques, phony "think tanks," and funding used to pervert scientific fact, this book serves as a wake-up call to those who still wish to deny the inconvenient truth.

Loss of Large Predators Has Caused Widespread Disruption of Ecosystems

The decline of large predators and other "apex consumers" at the top of the food chain has disrupted ecosystems all over the planet, according to a review of recent findings conducted by an international team of scientists and published in the July 15 issue of Science. The study looked at research on a wide range of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems and concluded that "the loss of apex consumers is arguably humankind's most pervasive influence on the natural world."

According to first author James Estes, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, large animals were once ubiquitous across the globe, and they shaped the structure and dynamics of ecosystems. Their decline, largely caused by humans through hunting and habitat fragmentation, has had far-reaching and often surprising consequences, including changes in vegetation, wildfire frequency, infectious diseases, invasive species, water quality, and nutrient cycles.

The decline of apex consumers has been most pronounced among the big predators, such as wolves and lions on land, whales and sharks in the oceans, and large fish in freshwater ecosystems. But there have also been dramatic declines in populations of many large herbivores, such as elephants and bison. The loss of apex consumers from an ecosystem triggers an ecological phenomenon known as a "trophic cascade," a chain of effects moving down through lower levels of the food chain.

"The top-down effects of apex consumers in an ecosystem are fundamentally important, but it is a complicated phenomenon," Estes said. "They have diverse and powerful effects on the ways ecosystems work, and the loss of these large animals has widespread implications."

Estes and his coauthors cite a wide range of examples in their review, including the following:

•The extirpation of wolves in Yellowstone National Park led to over-browsing of aspen and willows by elk, and restoration of wolves has allowed the vegetation to recover.

•The reduction of lions and leopards in parts of Africa has led to population outbreaks and changes in behavior of olive baboons, increasing their contact with people and causing higher rates of intestinal parasites in both people and baboons.

•A rinderpest epidemic decimated the populations of wildebeest and other ungulates in the Serengeti, resulting in more woody vegetation and increased extent and frequency of wildfires prior to rinderpest eradication in the 1960s.

•Dramatic changes in coastal ecosystems have followed the collapse and recovery of sea otter populations; sea otters maintain coastal kelp forests by controlling populations of kelp-grazing sea urchins.

•The decimation of sharks in an estuarine ecosystem caused an outbreak of cow-nosed rays and the collapse of shellfish populations.

Despite these and other well-known examples, the extent to which ecosystems are shaped by such interactions has not been widely appreciated. "There's been a tendency to see it as idiosyncratic and specific to particular species and ecosystems," Estes said.

One reason for this is that the top-down effects of apex predators are difficult to observe and study. "These interactions are invisible unless there is some perturbation that reveals them," Estes said. "With these large animals, it's impossible to do the kinds of experiments that would be needed to show their effects, so the evidence has been acquired as a result of natural changes and long-term records."

Estes has been studying coastal ecosystems in the North Pacific for several decades, doing pioneering work on the ecological roles of sea otters and killer whales. In 2008, he and coauthor John Terborgh of Duke University organized a conference on trophic cascades, which brought together scientists studying a wide range of ecosystems. The recognition that similar top-down effects have been observed in many different systems was a catalyst for the new paper.

The study's findings have profound implications for conservation. "To the extent that conservation aims toward restoring functional ecosystems, the reestablishment of large animals and their ecological effects is fundamental," Estes said. "This has huge implications for the scale at which conservation can be done. You can't restore large apex consumers on an acre of land. These animals roam over large areas, so it's going to require large-scale approaches."

The paper's coauthors include 24 scientists from various institutions in six countries. Support for the study was provided by the Institute for Ocean Conservation Science, Defenders of Wildlife, White Oak Plantation, U.S. National Science Foundation, NSERC Canada, and NordForsk.

Science Daily (July 14, 2011)

Japan Goes Solar

A $286 Billion Dollar Solar Pay Day
The anti-nuclear movement got a real boost following the Fukushima crisis. There's no doubt about that. And as a result, renewable energy was once again paraded around as one of the many forms of clean energy that could be used to displace any nuclear power that would be phased out in Japan...Especially solar.

A few months ago, Prime Minister Naoto Kan announced a plan that would put solar panels on about 10 million roofs by 2030. Of course, he gave little details on how such a plan would be funded. But since the announcement, a number of high-level government officials have called for a solar feed-in tariff similar to that of Germany's.

University of Tokyo professor Ryoichi Komiyama recently offered his analysis of the effects of such a tariff, and noted that in a scenario where the country would seek 30 gigawatts of solar, a $261 billion market for solar panel production and installation would be created.

In the case of utility-scale solar, Komiyama added that developers would potentially have to spend an additional $25 billion for about 8 gigawatts of batteries.

As you know, we've long been bullish on utility-scale batteries, particularly in the case of solar. I would even argue that if Japan were to go full force on a solar feed-in tariff, it would be the utility-scale battery players providing the biggest pay day for investors.

You see, of the top five solar panel producers in Japan, only one is a pure play. And that's Suntech Power (NYSE: STP), which is actually the world's largest solar panel producer. If Japan were to implement this feed-in tariff, Suntech would get a huge boost.

Also benefiting from the tariff will be Sharp (PINK SHEETS: SHCAY), Kyocera (NYSE: KYO), Panasonic Corp (NYSE: PC), and Mitsubishi Electric Corp (PINK SHEETS: MIELY).

A Solar Market on Steroids

If Japan were to implement this feed-in tariff, we'll also see an even quicker drop in production costs. As my colleague Nick Hodge pointed out last week, for every doubling of solar manufacturing capacity, production costs fall about 20 percent.

With a Japanese feed-in tariff implemented, you can be sure that solar manufacturing would kick into overdrive with a serious shot of steroids. And consider Japan's energy demands as the world's third largest economy. They're talking about 30 gigawatts of installed solar, or 75 percent of what the entire world installed from 2000 to 2010. This is a very big deal.

To take it one step further, Japan's environment ministry indicated the potential for commercial solar projects could theoretically reach 150 gigawatts. That's about ten times the capacity of Germany, currently the world's largest solar market.

Of course, it all comes down to how aggressive the Japanese want to be. While there have been dozens of polls showing Japanese consumers want to transition to cleaner forms of power generation, the question is, Will they be willing to pay for it?

I can't imagine Japan's total installed solar reaching 150 gigawatts anytime within the next 20 to 30 years. I just don't think there would be enough political support for it. And I'm pretty sure no matter how much the Japanese despise nuclear right now, they're probably not going to be too willing to pony up any significant increases in their utility bills in order to pay for the integration of 150 gigawatts of solar...

That being said, a temporary feed-in tariff used to get 30 gigawatts installed over the course of 20 years is not out of the question. And if there's any indication that this tariff will actually get approved, you would be wise to load up on a few solar and utility-scale battery stocks. We saw what Germany's aggressive feed-in tariff did for solar investors. It essentially launched a solar bull market. The impact of a similar feed-in tariff in Japan would do the same — but on a much bigger level. To a new way of life, and a new generation of wealth...

Article by Jeff Siegel June 27, 2011

Solio Classic Universal Hybrid Charger

A tiny fraction of the energy emitted by the sun is enough to power your needs many times over. Harness that energy quickly and effectively with Solio Solar Chargers. The Solio charger is a solar powered energy source that can power all of your electronic devices from cell phones to iPods to GPS systems. The sleek, ultra modern design is also compact and lightweight making it great for any travel use.

Provides an emergency power source when away from power outlets to keep you going anywhere

Works with multiple gadgets, including mobile phones, Bluetooth headsets, smartphones/PDAs, MP3 players, portable gaming devices, digital cameras, GPS and more. Convenient compact, lightweight design is perfect for travel or emergency use. All Solio chargers are made from Reusable and recyclable materials to help you give back to the environment even after you are done using your charger.

Solio has been designed to harness the sun’s energy, shortening the process of transforming it into electricity by using photovoltaic cells (PVs). PVs convert sunlight into electricity that can be used immediately. The process is clean, fast, noiseless, and—thanks to Solio—easily portable. Here’s how it works. Light from the sun hits the solar cells, exciting electrons within the cell. Some of them break free, and are channeled through a conductive metal strip to create an electric current. This current can either be stored in a battery or used directly in the form of electricity. The stronger the sunlight and the more rays that hit the cell, the more electricity is generated. Solio features a fan-blade design that allows it to achieve maximum solar area when in use. Just spread out the blades, expose them to direct sunlight either out of doors or affixed to a window, and get ready to take your power on the road.

Charging Solio's internal battery takes 8-10 hours of direct sunlight. Solio will charge your device at the same rate as your conventional charger. Using the included wall adapter, solio will fully charge in approximately 4 hours. A fully charged Solio will completely charge an average cell phone at least twice.

When charging a cell phone directly from the sun, 60 minutes of sunlight will provide approximately 25 minutes of talk time and ten hours of standby time. When charging an iPod directly from the sun, one hour of sunlight will provide about one hour of play time. Solio can store energy for up to one year.

Solio Classic Universal Hybrid Charger

Climate Change Reducing Ocean's Carbon Dioxide Uptake, New Analysis Shows: ENN

As one of the planet's largest single carbon absorbers, the ocean takes up roughly one-third of all human carbon emissions, reducing atmospheric carbon dioxide and its associated global changes.

But whether the ocean can continue mopping up human-produced carbon at the same rate is still up in the air. Previous studies on the topic have yielded conflicting results, says University of Wisconsin-Madison assistant professor Galen McKinley.
In a new analysis published online July 10 in Nature Geoscience, McKinley and her colleagues identify a likely source of many of those inconsistencies and provide some of the first observational evidence that climate change is negatively impacting the ocean carbon sink.

"The ocean is taking up less carbon because of the warming caused by the carbon in the atmosphere," says McKinley, an assistant professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences and a member of the Center for Climatic Research in the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.

The analysis differs from previous studies in its scope across both time and space. One of the biggest challenges in asking how climate is affecting the ocean is simply a lack of data, McKinley says, with available information clustered along shipping lanes and other areas where scientists can take advantage of existing boat traffic. With a dearth of other sampling sites, many studies have simply extrapolated trends from limited areas to broader swaths of the ocean.

McKinley and colleagues at UW-Madison, the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, and the Universite Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris expanded their analysis by combining existing data from a range of years (1981-2009), methodologies, and locations spanning most of the North Atlantic into a single time series for each of three large regions called gyres, defined by distinct physical and biological characteristics.

They found a high degree of natural variability that often masked longer-term patterns of change and could explain why previous conclusions have disagreed. They discovered that apparent trends in ocean carbon uptake are highly dependent on exactly when and where you look -- on the 10- to 15-year time scale, even overlapping time intervals sometimes suggested opposite effects.

"Because the ocean is so variable, we need at least 25 years' worth of data to really see the effect of carbon accumulation in the atmosphere," she says. "This is a big issue in many branches of climate science -- what is natural variability, and what is climate change?"

Working with nearly three decades of data, the researchers were able to cut through the variability and identify underlying trends in the surface CO2 throughout the North Atlantic.

During the past three decades, increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide have largely been matched by corresponding increases in dissolved carbon dioxide in the seawater. The gases equilibrate across the air-water interface, influenced by how much carbon is in the atmosphere and the ocean and how much carbon dioxide the water is able to hold as determined by its water chemistry.

But the researchers found that rising temperatures are slowing the carbon absorption across a large portion of the subtropical North Atlantic. Warmer water cannot hold as much carbon dioxide, so the ocean's carbon capacity is decreasing as it warms.

In watching for effects of increasing atmospheric carbon on the ocean's uptake, many people have looked for indications that the carbon content of the ocean is rising faster than that of the atmosphere, McKinley says. However, their new results show that the ocean sink could be weakening even without that visible sign.

"More likely what we're going to see is that the ocean will keep its equilibration but it doesn't have to take up as much carbon to do it because it's getting warmer at the same time," she says. "We are already seeing this in the North Atlantic subtropical gyre, and this is some of the first evidence for climate damping the ocean's ability to take up carbon from the atmosphere."

She stresses the need to improve available datasets and expand this type of analysis to other oceans, which are relatively less-studied than the North Atlantic, to continue to refine carbon uptake trends in different ocean regions. This information will be critical for decision-making, since any decrease in ocean uptake may require greater human efforts to control carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

McKinley's work on the project was supported by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Natural Relief for Bug Bites and Poison Ivy

By Mao Shing Ni, L.Ac., D.O.M., PhD

All summer long, the elements give you reasons to itch and scratch. When the bee stings, the mosquito bites or the poison ivy comes creeping, try these all-natural remedies for a quick anti-itch fix.

Relief from Poison Ivy and Its Troublesome Siblings:

Poisons oak, ivy and sumac all contain an oily chemical known as urushiol, which irritates your skin and can produce a severe allergic reaction. While up to 30 percent of people are immune to these urushiol-induced allergies, those of us who are not so lucky can experience serious discomfort when we come in contact with this plant – including itching, redness, oozing skin and severe burning pain where the plant touched your skin.

A neighbor friend of mine, on a forest hike, blew his nose into a leaf: a poison ivy leaf. When I saw him that evening, he had welts and a rash covering his entire face and hands. Worse than the unbearable itch, he couldn’t even breathe from his nose because it was swollen shut. I immediately pulled up a couple of dandelion plants from my backyard and put them into a blender with honey and the gel scraped from an aloe leaf. After smearing the poultice all over his face, I sent him home with dandelions to make into a tea. By the next morning, his itching and rash were 75 percent better!

Here are more natural ways to soothe poison ivy:
1. Wash the contact area thoroughly. Because urushiol is an oily substance, water alone will not remove it; be sure to scrub with soap and water.

2. Crush dandelion greens. Apply to effected area as poultice, changing every hour. You can also put these into a blender with aloe gel and honey to make a smoother poultice.

3. Scrape aloe gel directly from the plant and apply generously to the affected area. This can lessen the symptoms of burning, itching and pain.

4. Mash plantain leaves and apply as poultice, changing every hour to relieve itching.

5. Chickweed root, magnolia flower, chrysanthemum flower and kudzu root are part of a traditional Chinese formula, which is used to reduce the allergic and inflammatory responses.

Take the Itch Out of Insect Bites

It’s humans versus bugs and, unfortunately, we are on the losing side most of the time. Though the bug bite itself is rarely painful, the body’s reaction can cause pain, itching, redness and swelling. In some cases, a serious allergic reaction called anaphylactic shock occurs, which can involve breathing difficulties and requires immediate medical attention.

Natural ways to soothe itchy bites:

1. Prevention is the easiest way to avoid dealing with insect bites. Avoid the toxic chemicals found in commercial insect repellents. Use natural alternatives, including oils made from lemongrass, citronella, eucalyptus, wintergreen, lavender and turmeric.

2. Once bitten, remove the stinger, if there is one, and clean area with water. Use an ice pack for temporary relief of severe itching and swelling.

3. Be as cool as a cucumber. Place cucumber skins on top of the bites to sooth the itching and irritation. You can also cut 2-inch round slices from a fresh eggplant and place on top of bite to draw out toxins and sooth the irritation.

4. Apply honey to a bug bite to sooth the skin. Because honey is a natural antibiotic, it can also help prevent infections.

5. Apply a blend of essential oils of eucalyptus, winter green and peppermint or tea tree oil to bites every 2 to 3 hours to relieve itching and aid healing.

Pursuing Plant Power

In a quest to build a better solar cell, North Carolina State University chemical engineer Orlin Velev is borrowing from nature’s experts in collecting the sun’s energy: leaves. Starting with the natural pigments that help plants harvest solar rays, Velev and his team have crafted a flexible, nontoxic photovoltaic device that he hopes could eventually generate clean electricity far more cheaply than today’s silicon-based solar panels.

Velev’s one-square-inch proto­types consist of light-sensitive molecules—including the photosynthesis powerhouse chlorophyll—embedded in a water-based gel sandwiched between copper and plastic electrodes. Unlike traditional solar cells, many of which contain toxic elements such as cadmium, the biologically derived materials in Velev’s device can be safely released into the environment after use. The cell’s flexibility could make it an ideal choice for covering irregular surfaces; large pieces could even be rolled up or folded for easy transportation.

“This is a totally different way of thinking compared to a semiconductor cell, which is solid and expensive,” Velev says. In the next stage of development, he aims to boost the efficiency of the design, which is currently less than one percent of that achieved by top-performing silicon solar cells.

Article by Victoria Tang: Discover Magazine

Power Generation from Renewables Surpasses Nuclear: ENN

The latest issue of the Monthly Energy Review published by the US Energy Information Administration, electric power generation from renewable sources has surpassed production from nuclear sources, and is now "closing in on oil," says Ken Bossong Executive Director of the Sun Day Campaign.

In the first quarter of 2011 renewable energy sources accounted for 11.73 percent of US domestic energy production. Renewable sources include solar, wind, geothermal, hydro, biomass/biofuel. As of the first quarter of 2011, energy production from these sources was 5.65 percent more than production from nuclear.

As Bossing further explains from the report, renewable sources are closing the gap with generation from oil-fired sources, with renewable source equal to 77.15 percent of total oil based generation.

For all sectors, including transportation, thermal, and electrical generation, renewable energy production grew just over 15 percent in the first quarter of 2011 compared to the first quarter of 2010, and fully 25 percent over first quarter 2009. In a break-down of renewable sources, biomass/biofuel accounted for a bit more than 48 percent, hydro for 35.41 percent, wind for nearly 13 percent, geothermal 2.45 percent, and solar at 1.16 percent.

Looking at just the electrical generation sector, renewable sources, including hydro, accounted for nearly 13 percent of net US electrical generation in the first quarter of 2011, up from 10.31 percent for the same quarter last year. Non-hydro renewable sources accounted for 4.74 percent of net US production.

CSR With Hotel Soap and "Clean the World": Environmental News Network

Have you ever given much thought to what happens to those little bars of soap that you come across in hotel rooms? What happens when you open one of those neatly packaged bars and use it? Perhaps you don’t even finish it and leave it there and assume housekeeping will throw it away. According to Clean the World, hotels discard millions of pounds of soap and shampoo in the U.S. These products often end up in already overflowing landfills and contaminate fragile groundwater systems.

Clean the World is a non-profit organization that distributes recycled soap products, along with appropriate educational materials to impoverished communities and to domestic homeless shelters. According to them, each year more than five million lives are lost to severe respiratory diseases with the majority of deaths being among children less than five years old. Studies have shown that simple hand washing substantially reduces the spread of these diseases. Unfortunately, the essential items for proper hand washing are unobtainable for millions of people worldwide.

They have developed a process to sanitize used hotel soap and leftover shampoo. They reform the soap into new bars and then send it to parts of the world that can use it. They have also partnered with a number of hotel chains to collect all the little bars of used soap. Many hotels have also partnered with Clean the World as part of their CSR initiatives to ensure that soap is recycled effectively. In just two years of operation, the NGO has distributed more than 8 million bars of soap to children and families in the U.S and more than 40 countries including Haiti, Japan, Zimbabwe, Uganda, India, Honduras, Mexico and Albania.

Vital Climate Change Warnings Are Being Ignored, Says Expert

ScienceDaily — Canada's inland waters, the countless lakes and reservoirs across the country, are important "sentinels" for climate change and Ottawa and the provinces are ignoring the warnings.
That's the message from University of Alberta biologist David Schindler and colleagues in a paper in the journal, Science.
Schindler is a co-author of Sentinels of Change, which reviewed papers addressing the effects of climate change revealed in numerous long-term studies presented at a conference last September.
In his paper, Schindler highlighted studies that have shown that Canada and the United States will have to rethink plans to use the Laurentian Great Lakes as an emergency water supply if a dramatic shortage befalls North America in the future. Data collected by researchers indicate the water balance is the Laurentian Great Lakes is precarious because it is only renewing itself at the rate of less than one per cent a year.
Schindler and his co-authors also analyze a study involving carbon emissions. "Recent studies show that lakes release very high releases of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, in many cases higher than the surrounding forests in the same watersheds. This has been missed in climate modeling to date."
Schindler says more inland water studies are needed in Canada because they provide valuable data on water levels, carbon cycles, acid rain and the frequency of forest fires. There are three long-term inland water studies in Canada, all of them in Ontario. Schindler is calling for more funding and expansion of the research program.

Pros and cons of nuclear power: Timeforchange.org

As a result of the current discussion how further global warming could be prevented or at least mitigated, the revival of nuclear power seems to be in everybody's - or at least in many politician's - mind. It it interesting to see that in many suggestions to mitigate global warming, the focus is put on the advantages of nuclear power generation, its disadvantages are rarely mentioned.
Hopefully, the following summary of arguments for and against nuclear power can fill this gap:

Advantages of nuclear power generation:
Nuclear power generation does emit relatively low amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2). The emissions of green house gases and therefore the contribution of nuclear power plants to global warming is therefore relatively little.
This technology is readily available, it does not have to be developed first.
It is possible to generate a high amount of electrical energy in one single plant.

Disadvantages of nuclear power generation:
The problem of radioactive waste is still an unsolved one. The waste from nuclear energy is extremely dangerous and it has to be carefully looked after for several thousand years (10'000 years according to United States Environmental Protection Agency standards).
High risks: Despite a generally high security standard, accidents can still happen. It is technically impossible to build a plant with 100% security. A small probability of failure will always last. The consequences of an accident would be absolutely devastating both for human being as for the nature. The more nuclear power plants (and nuclear waste storage shelters) are built, the higher is the probability of a disastrous failure like the recent catastrophe in Japan.
Nuclear power plants as well as nuclear waste could be preferred targets for terrorist attacks. No atomic energy plant in the world could withstand an attack similar to 9/11 in Yew York. Such a terrorist act would have catastrophic effects for the whole world.
During the operation of nuclear power plants, radioactive waste is produced, which in turn can be used for the production of nuclear weapons. In addition, the same know-how used to design nuclear power plants can to a certain extent be used to build nuclear weapons (nuclear proliferation).
The energy source for nuclear energy is Uranium. Uranium is a scarce resource, its supply is estimated to last only for the next 30 to 60 years depending on the actual demand.
The time frame needed for formalities, planning and building of a new nuclear power generation plant is in the range of 20 to 30 years in the western democracies. In other words: It is an illusion to build new nuclear power plants in a short time.

Sustainability: Is nuclear energy sustainable?
For several reasons, nuclear power is neither «green» nor sustainable:
Both the nuclear waste as well as retired nuclear plants are a life-threatening legacy for hundreds of future generations. It flagrantly contradicts with the thoughts of sustainability if future generations have to deal with dangerous waste generated from preceding generations.
Uranium, the source of energy for nuclear power, is available on earth only in limited quantities. Uranium is being «consumed» (i.e. converted) during the operation of the nuclear power plant so it won't be available any more for future generations. This again contradicts the principle of sustainability.

Is nuclear power renewable energy?
Nuclear energy uses Uranium as fuel, which is a scarce resource. The supply of Uranium is expected to last only for the next 30 to 60 years (depending on the actual demand). Therefore nuclear energy is NOT a renewable energy.

Natural Detox: Dr. John Douillard

Dr. John Douillard shows you how the ancient science of Ayurveda provides a healthy daily routine and eating plan that will detoxify your body naturally. In today’s culture, we’re exposed to toxins everywhere — even in our food, water and air. All these contaminants lead to toxic conditions in our bodies such as low energy, weight gain and achy and inflamed joints. Even allergies can be traced to our toxic environment. Try the 4-day cleanse program designed to burn toxic-storing fat and see how good it feels to reset your system.