Category Archives: Earth News

Popularity of plastic takes toll on oceans, puts human health at risk

Our love affair with plastic—from water bottles, shopping bags, and drinking straws, to consumer product packaging—is taking a toll on the world’s oceans, and damaging the health of people, marine birds, and animals. The filmmakers and scientists behind a new documentary exploring this problem recently joined Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health community members for a film screening and panel discussion. Experts offered solutions for policymakers, as well as steps ordinary citizens can take to reduce plastic pollution.

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/features/plastic-pollution-harms-oceans-health/

‘We can save life on Earth’: study reveals how to stop mass extinction

Mongabay.com–Apr 18, 2017

The researchers say while many ecosystems have been highly degraded, achieving 50 percent protection is still possible –

Mapping the World’s Ocean Ecosystems

United States Geological Survey (press release)–Apr 24, 2017

The world’s oceans are vital to life on Earth. They provide food, moderate the climate, water the land, and drive the local and global economy.

UN celebrates International Mother Earth Day with awareness …

Pulse Headlines–Apr 22, 2017

International Mother Earth Day is celebrated every year as a reminder to people that Earth and its ecosystems provide us with life, and that it …

CIRCULAR ECONOMY OFFERS “WEALTH OF OPPORTUNITY FOR U.S.”

Trash to Treasure: Changing Waste Streams to Profit Streams, a new report launched by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, focuses on waste in American companies and industries, and argues that the circular economy represents an economic opportunity, as well as being a model that reduces waste.

The largest 5589 publicly trading businesses in the U.S. sent 342 million metric tons of waste to landfills and incinerators in 2014, according to the report, an economic cost to those companies in terms of removal, and a reality that also has significant environmental and social impacts.

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Corn Lobby’s GMO Labeling Study “Preposterous”

grocery-shopping Labeling food that contains genetically engineered, or “GMO,” ingredients will not cost the preposterous $81.9 billion that the corn industry claims.

The new study – paid for by the Corn Refiners Association – greatly exaggerates the cost of labeling products that contain GMOs. It claims that a GMO labeling law set to go into effect in Vermont on July 1 would cost each American family more than $1,000 a year.

This study is riddled with flaws.

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A Zero Emissions Manifesto for the Climate Justice Movement

“Zero emissions is an ambitious but achievable goal.”
–UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

Zero has become the most important number for humanity. Why?

Any chance of stabilizing the climate hinges on transitioning to zero greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as humanly possible. Simply slowing the rise of emissions will not work. For the first time, the world’s leading climate authority, theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has embraced a goal of near zero greenhouse gas emissions or below.

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