Half of China's water polluted and undrinkable: study

Reuters via Environmental News Network reports on China's polluted water supplies where more than half is undrinkable and one quarter unsuitable for industrial use.

Inspectors from China's Ministry of Environmental Protection tested water samples from the country's major rivers and lakes in the first half of the year and declared just 49.3 percent to be safe for drinking, up from 48 percent last year, the ministry said in a notice posted on its website (www.mep.gov.cn).

Despite tougher regulations over the last decade, the ministry has struggled to rein in the thousands of small paper mills, cement factories and chemical plants discharging industrial waste directly into the country's waterways, and the overuse of fertilizers has also left large sections of China's lakes and rivers choking with algae.

Read the full story: Pollution makes quarter of China water unusable

Photo from My Health Beijing

Oil-affected sea turtles won't be "incinerated alive"; BP, enviro groups, US Coast Guard

Reuters reports that an agreement between BP, environmental groups and the U.S. Coast Guard to burn off oil in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill won't burn sea turtles caught up in the oil.

Under the accord reached in talks on Thursday evening and Friday morning, the parties agreed to a plan allowing biologists or other trained wildlife observers to accompany oil-incineration vessels at sea to remove as many turtles as possible from designated areas before burning starts.

Private boat captains chartered for wildlife rescue missions in the Gulf said in affidavits filed with the lawsuit that young sea turtles tend to congregate among oil blobs floating in the water, apparently unable to distinguish between the oil and mats of seaweed that provide natural shelter on the surface of the Gulf.

The turtles are then presumably swept up and unable to escape when shrimp boats contracted for cleanup operations are used to drag fire-resistant booms to encircle the floating oil before it is set ablaze.

Read the full story: Deal struck to save turtles from Gulf oil burns

Photo from Tour de Turtles

Deforestation = more malaria; study

Reuters reports that malaria rates rise when the forests are cut down in the Amazon according to a study by U.S. researchers.

The scientists found in their study, published in Emerging Infectious Diseases journal, a 48 percent increase in malaria rates in Brazil after 4 percent of the tree cover was cut down.

"Conservation policy and public health policy are one and the same," Jonathan Patz, the professor who oversaw the work, said in a telephone interview. "How we manage our landscapes and, in this case, tropical rain forest has implications for public health."

Malaria, caused by a parasite transmitted by mosquitoes, kills about 860,000 people a year globally, according to the World Health Organization. Brazil has about 500,000 cases a year of malaria, most carried by Anopheles darling mosquito.

Patz's team has been tracking mosquito populations and how they change as forests are cut down in Brazil and Peru. They took satellite data showing changes in tree cover in one county of Brazil's Amazon region and linked it with health records showing diagnosed cases of malaria.

Read the full story: Cleared forests lead to rise in malaria in Brazil

Photo from Nature's Crusaders / Stephen Ferry / Getty

Electric car to power utilities and income

Reuters reports on the University of Delaware researchers who have fashioned an electric car to not only run on just electricity but also to store and generate electricity for utilities.

This technology on the prototype car is called vehicle-to-grid or V2G and the professors hope this will also generate future revenue.

To help lay the groundwork for V2G in Delaware, the state passed a 2009 law - the first of its kind in the world -- requiring utilities to compensate electric car owners for power sent back to the grid at the same rate they pay to charge the battery.

At a current cost of about $75,000 per [Toyota] Scion - including V2G conversion and the basic car -- the vehicles are beyond the reach of most drivers. But [Professor Willett Kempton, who is leading the university's V2G program], argues that costs will fall as production increases. With all costs optimized, a V2G car should eventually sell for $3,000-$5,000 more than an equivalent gasoline model, he said.

And Kempton estimates that the value of providing storage and electricity generation to utilities is $4000 per year.

Read the full story: Electric cars give power back to grid

Photo from University of Delaware

Pedal the New Zealand monorail

Reuters video (that does not allow embedding anymore by the way) reports on a new bicycling monorail in New Zealand.

The Schweeb utilizes a special clear pod that users pedal to get around on the set monorail track in Rotorua, New Zealand.

Right now it's in development but the creators hope to incorporate their technology in cities as a clean transport system.

Watch the video: A monorail that gets you pedaling

2009: fifth warmest year

Reuters reports that 2009 will have been the fifth warmest ever recorded and the hottest this decade according to the World Meteorological Organization.

The WMO reported its findings at this week's United Nations Climate conference in Copenhagen.

WMO head Michel Jarraud pointed to extreme hotspots this year -- Australia had its third warmest year since record dating began in 1850, "with three exceptional heatwaves."

"I could go on. There was the worst drought in five decades which affected millions of people in China, a poor monsoon season in India causing severe droughts, massive food shortages associated with a big drought in Kenya," he told reporters.

Read the full story: 2009 set to be fifth warmest year on record

Photo from Reuters

Icy Italian PM shows irony

Reuters reports on the ironic ice statue of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi unveiled today in the Roman Forum.

The statue is timed to melt by the start of the U.N. climate change summit on December 7 in Copenhagen, Denmark.

"Berlusconi don't be stupid -- save the climate," read the slogan on the ice sculpture, which stood next to an ancient stone statue of Roman emperor Julius Caesar.

Greenpeace said in a report accompanying its pre-summit stunt that 93 percent of Italy's energy still comes from fossil fuels. The government hopes to revive nuclear energy, which it quit two decades ago, to help cut emissions and energy bills.

Read the full story: Ice statue chides Berlusconi for being cool on CO2

KLM tests first passenger flight fueled with renewables

Reuters video reports on the first passenger airplane flight using renewable fuels.

KLM Dutch Airlines flight which circled the skies over The Netherlands used a 50/50 mix of biofuel and traditional fuel. Although it carried passengers it was still a test flight.

Watch the report below:

Deforestation caused Peruvian natives decline; study

Reuters reports that deforestation caused the decline of Peruvian natives called the Nasca according to a new study.

The Nasca people, famed for the lines that depict animals or geometric shapes most clearly visible from the air, became unable to grow enough food in nearby valleys because the lack of trees made the climate too dry, scientists said.

The report, led by Cambridge University in England, said that the findings showed a need for more action now to protect the world's arid lands.

Read the full story: Deforestation sped demise of Nasca in Peru: study

Photo from Thomson Reuters

Saving Ecuador's condors

Reuters video reports on Ecuador's efforts to save their endangered condor.

Indigenous to the country, the scavenger birds are being bred in captivity because their native habitat is now occupied by people. Ecuadorian conservationists hope to revive the birds that have already been wiped out in neighboring Venezuela.

Watch the report below:

English pumpkin mural draws Halloween visitors

Reuters video reports on the West Essex, England "pumpkin house" mural created every year around Halloween by Tony Smith.

Watch the video below:

Electric cars not so clean; report

Reuters reports that electric cars aren't as clean as touted according to a new scientific report.

"For electric vehicles to become a major green alternative, the power fuel mix has to move away from coal, or cleaner coal technologies have to be developed," said Jared Cohon, the chair of a National Research Council report released on Monday called "Hidden Costs of Energy: Unpriced Consequences of Energy Production and Use."

About half of U.S. power is generated by burning coal, which emits many times more of traditional pollutants, such as particulates and smog components, than natural gas, and about twice as much of the main greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

Read the full story: Electric cars don't deserve halo yet: study

Photo by Thomas Peter / REUTERS

Drive through and create power

Reuters video reports on a New Jersey fast food drive-thru that is helping to test an energy capturing prototype.

New Energy Technologies Inc. is testing a new kinetic energy capturing device that looks like a speed bump at a Hillside, New Jersey Burger King. When cars slow down to go over the Motion Power bump, energy is captured and can be used to power the restaurant.

Watch the video below:

100-year-old Galapagos tortoise could be father

Reuters video reports that Lonesome George, the only surviving Galapagos giant tortoise, could finally be a father at the age of almost 100.

Eggs were found in George's habitat in July, transferred to an incubation center, but have a four-month wait before scientists will know if they are fertile or not.

Giant tortoises dwindled to extinction on the northern Galapagos island of Pinta in the 1960s and their habitat was destroyed by goats. George was found in 1972 and brought to the Charles Darwin research station where scientists have tried to mate him with females of a subspecies.

Eggs were discovered last year but were infertile.

Watch the report below:


For more on Galapagos read our previous post on the islands' overpopulation problems

Electric Trabant unveiled

Reuters video reports on the Frankfurt car show where three new electric car models were shown as well as an electric Trabant.

Trabants, nicknamed Trabis, were the most common and often only available car in communist East Germany. Residents waited 15 years to even receive one of these cars after they had put in an order. They are now seen as a symbol of the former communist country and regarded with a "derisive affection," according to Wikipedia.

Watch the report below:

Cars to run on used clothing?

Reuters video reports on bio-fuel made from old clothing.

Swedish engineers have created a chemical process that breaks down cotton and synthetic fabrics into bio-fuel (ethanol and methane) which could fuel vehicles.

The scientists claim that this process uses less energy than extracting from plant sources and "50 percent more ethanol is produced."

Watch the report below:

Did global warming help Incas?

Reuters video reports on the new theory that South America's Inca population was helped by a warming planet.

Scientists now believe that the Incas were able to expand their food crops to higher altitudes when the temperature went up and thus able to sustain their growing population.

Watch the full report below:

Berlin solar-powered boat launch

Reuters video reports on the new solar-powered boat that will take visitors around Berlin, Germany's rivers.

The 60-passenger boat called Solon is powered solely by the solar panels placed on the roof. The panels soak in the sun and the energy produced is stored in batteries. Another benefit is that no smelly fumes and barely any noise comes from running the boat.

Watch the video below:

Take kids to new green theme park

Reuters blogs reports on the new California theme park with an environmental focus.

Environmentaland, created by nonprofit environmental group Global Inheritance, opened this month in Hollywood.

Visitors can ride a see-saw on an energy playground to power up their cell phone, putt on a desert mini golf course and fly airplanes from recycled paper. This past weekend, visitors could arm wrestle a polar bear in a climate change quiz challenge for a chance to win prizes.

Read the full story: Mickey Mouse meets Mr. Polar Bear at green theme park

Cape Cod wind farm controversy

Reuters video reports on the controversy over a proposed wind farm off the heavily touristed coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

Cape Wind corporation claims their installation will "produce 75 percent of the cape and islands electricity."

Opponents claim the 440 foot turbines will ruin the natural landscape that tourists come for and hurt the economy when those visitors vacation elsewhere.

Watch the report below: