Nature Blog Networking: Sing Sing Singapore pt 2
on the Nature Blog Network
How you can help us to protect wildlife in Malaysia
on the Bornean Sun Bear Conservation blog
Rich Biodiversity @ Punggol Wasteland (Part 2)
on the Beauty of Fauna and Flora in Nature blog
Tiger Shrike takes a beetle
on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog
Nesting of the Banded Kingfisher
on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog
New headland to be constructed at East Coast Park
on the wild shores of singapore blog
ScienceDaily 5 May 09;
Between 129 and 221 new species of frogs have been identified in Madagascar, practically doubling the currently known amphibian fauna. The finding suggests that the number of amphibian species in Madagascar, one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots, has been significantly underestimated. According to the researchers, if these results are extrapolated at a global scale, the number of amphibian species worldwide could double.
Their study, conducted with participation of the Spanish Scientific Research Council (CSIC), is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
As Professor David R. Vieites, CSIC researcher at the Spanish National Natural Sciences Museum in Madrid, states: “the diversity of species in Madagascar is far from being known and there is still a lot of scientific research to be done. Our data suggest that the number of new species of amphibians not only has been underestimated but it is spatially widespread, even in well studied areas. For example, two of the most visited and studied National parks, Ranomafana and MantadÃa/Analamazaotra, harbour 31 and 10 new species respectively.”
Dr. Frank Glaw, curator of herpetology at the Zoologische Staatssammlung from Munich explains: ”During the past 15 years, we discovered and described over 100 new frog species from Madagascar, which led us to believe that our species inventory is almost complete. But as our new surveys show, there are many more species than we suspected.”
The paper suggests that the total biodiversity on the island could be much higher also in other groups, so the actual destruction of natural habitats may be affecting more species than previously thought. This is important for conservation planning, as the rate of destruction of rainforests in Madagascar has been one of the highest in the planet, with more than 80% of the historic surface of rainforest already lost.
“Although a lot of reserves and national parks have been created in Madagascar during the last decade, the actual situation of politic instability is allowing the cut of the forest within national parks, generating a lot of uncertainty about the future of the planned network of protected areas,” explains Vieites. Almost a quarter of the new species discovered have not been found yet in protected areas.
Biodiversity
The study proposes different criteria -- morphological, genetic and bioacoustic -- to assign the candidate species (the ones which have been identified as potential new species but not yet formerly described) to different categories. In Madagascar, the number of candidate species is higher than the number of described species in some genera.
“Using these criteria and the integration of different techniques under the principle of congruence could help to boost the inventory and the process of species description worldwide,” explains Vieites. Dr. Miguel Vences, professor at the Technical University of Braunschweig adds: "People think that we know which plant and animal species live on this planet. But the century of discoveries has only just begun – the majority of life forms on Earth is still awaiting scientific recognition."
Also participating in the study were researchers from the Technical University of Braunschweig, Museo regionale di Scienze Naturali from Torino, and the Hessisches Landesmuseum from Darmstadt.
Madagascar is the fourth largest island in the world and one of the most biodiverse areas globally, with a high degree of endemic species. “To get an idea of its biodiversity, while in the Iberian Peninsula are about 30 species of amphibians and in Germany about 20, in a single locality in Madagascar we can find ca. 100 species of frogs,” explains Vieites.
Today Online 6 May 09;
Big or small, if you “design right from day one” there will be cost energy savings.
It’s just that with bigger properties, the energy savings are “more obvious” said the Building and Construction Authority’s (BCA) deputy director of technology development division Tan Tian Chong.
He was responding to a query on why the $100-million green mark incentive scheme to encourage developers and building owners to retrofit their buildings with energy-efficient design and practices, only applies to existing developments with a gross floor area of 2,000 square metres and above.
Mr Tan, who was speaking at an industry get together of planners, architects and developers yesterday, said that since most of Singapore’s residential properties are condominiums, the incentives would be most felt there. But there is nothing to stop smaller landed property owners from designing green and it is a misconception that green buildings cost more.
“It depends on how you design your building. If you design right from day one, the premium can be as low as 2 to 3 per cent instead of 6 to 7 per cent,” he said.
Mr Tan also announced that BCA will launch the inaugural International Green Building Conference in October during BEX Asia, Southeast Asia’s green building exhibition.
Esther Ng
Green technologies to win you over
BCA event to help realise 80% target for eco-friendly buildings
Jessica Cheam, Straits Times 6 May 09;
SINGAPORE'S nascent green building industry is set to get a boost from a new event in October which will showcase the best of the Republic's technologies.
The Building and Construction Authority (BCA) yesterday announced that it will hold the inaugural International Green Building Conference on Oct 28.
The three-day event aims to attract 1,000 participants from around the region.
BCA director of technology development Tan Tian Chong told reporters yesterday the event will help realise Singapore's goal of greening 80 per cent of all its 15,500 buildings by 2030 from the current 1 per cent.
This was one of the targets outlined in a blueprint on sustainable development unveiled by the Government last week.
'Such events will continue to raise the awareness and adoption of environmentally friendlier, more sustainable designs, materials and construction methods among builders and developers in the region,' he said.
The conference will be held in partnership with BEX Asia, a green building exhibition organised by events firm Reed Exhibitions, which expects to attract 5,000 participants from more than 16 countries.
Mr Ashvinkumar Kantilal, president of the Singapore Institute of Architects, another event partner, said yesterday that architects have seen a big rise in the number of developers requiring green features in their buildings.
'The buy-in from the industry has been very rapid, as building owners recognise the potential savings from building green,' said Mr Kantilal, adding that this has been aided by cash incentives given out by the BCA to building owners.
The success of Singapore's Green Mark scheme, used to rate a building's environmental performance, has even led Malaysia's building industry to work with local players here to develop its own green building scheme, he added.
The BCA will also be opening Singapore's first zero-energy building at the conference. The complex will have a net zero energy consumption over a year, made possible by solar panels covering an area of 1,300 sq m which will be integrated on the roof of one of the buildings.
Green building events may add buzz to industry
Downturn may have some impact on the conference and exhibition: BCA
Business Times 6 May 09;
THE Building & Construction Authority (BCA) expects 800 to 1,000 local and foreign participants to turn up for its inaugural International Green Building Conference in October.
The conference, which will focus on green building technologies and designs, will take place alongside South-east Asia's green building exhibition BEX Asia, which could draw another 5,000 visitors.
The economic downturn may have some impact on the events, said BCA director of technology development Tan Tian Chong.
But with new incentives to get at least 80 per cent of buildings in Singapore Green Mark-certified by 2030, they may 'add more buzz to the industry and create an interest to improve the value and energy efficiency of existing buildings'.
Last week, the government introduced several schemes to promote sustainable development in Singapore.
For instance, BCA launched a $100 million Green Mark incentive scheme for existing buildings to entice owners of some private non-residential developments to carry out energy efficiency retrofitting.
According to Mr Tan, BCA's co-funding can help shorten the investment's payback period by as much as a third.
The agency found in a study that a building with the Green Mark platinum rating can carry a cost premium of 2 to 8 per cent, with a payback period of two to eight years.
President of the Singapore Institute of Architects Ashvinkumar Kantilal, who is also projects director at Architects 61, said his firm has got 'quite a handful of enquiries' in the past two days from clients who wish to know if they can benefit from the green incentives.
He believes other architectural firms are seeing a similar trend.
BCA said that 245 buildings have received Green Mark certification.
They have a gross floor area (GFA) of around 10.47 million sq m, out of a total building stock of about 210 million sq m.
Of the 245 buildings, however, only 60 are complete and in use, representing a GFA of around 1.7 million sq m.
Reuters AlertNet 16 Apr 09;
JAKARTA, 14 April 2009 (IRIN) - In the coastal areas of Riau Province on Indonesia's Sumatra Island, fishermen who once saw their livelihoods hit by declining fish stocks are beginning to see their catch increase again.
According to the oceanography research centre of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences, this is the result of community-based efforts to protect the area's coral reefs and keep the waters safe from illegal fishing.
"Before, local fishermen were discouraged, because they would protect the coral reefs but transboundary fishermen [from beyond Indonesia] would come and get their fish," Suharsono, the centre's director, told IRIN. "But since the local government gave them the right to manage their area, they have been successful in keeping transboundary fishermen away."
The Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) [see: http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=79862], which covers maritime areas around the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Timor-Leste, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, hopes to replicate efforts like these, and bring hope to fishing communities.
The triangle contains more than a third of all known coral species on earth, 53 percent of the world's coral reefs, more than 3,000 fish species, the greatest extent of mangrove forests of any region in the world, and the spawning grounds for the largest tuna fishery in the world, according to data from the CTI Secretariat.
Threats
However, the triangle is under threat from overfishing, illegal fishing methods and climate change.
The destruction of the coral reefs in the triangle poses a threat to some 120 million people who depend on its marine resources, and to global tuna supplies.
Less than two years after CTI was first proposed in August 2007, a plan of action is expected to be signed by the leaders of all six participating countries during a summit on 15 May [see: http://www.woc2009.org/home.php].
The plan includes commitments to effectively manage priority seascapes and marine protected areas, adopt climate change adaptation measures, and improve the status of threatened species, as well as the livelihoods and incomes of millions of people living in coastal areas within the triangle.
"The CTI is an unprecedented cooperation. This has never been seen before in the marine community," Rili Djohani, director of The Nature Conservancy in Indonesia [see: http://www.nature.org/wherewework/asiapacific/indonesia/], told a seminar in Jakarta on 14 April, adding that the summit is expected to result in a major funding boost for the project.
"What we have learned from this is that no one can do this alone. You can work together to make an impact."
jd/ds/cb
ScienceDaily 6 May 09;
Sharks, barracuda and other large predatory fishes disappear on Caribbean coral reefs as human populations rise, endangering the region's marine food web and ultimately its reefs and fisheries, according to a sweeping study by researcher Chris Stallings of The Florida State University Coastal and Marine Laboratory.
While other scientists working in the Caribbean have observed the declines of large predators for decades, the comprehensive work by Stallings documents the ominous patterns in far more detail at a much greater geographic scale than any other research to date.
"Seeing evidence of this ecological and economic travesty played out across the entire Caribbean is truly sobering," said Associate Professor John Bruno of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who served as the PLoS One academic editor for Stallings' new paper.
"I examined 20 species of predators, including sharks, groupers, snappers, jacks, trumpetfish and barracuda, from 22 Caribbean nations," said Stallings, a postdoctoral associate at the FSU Coastal and Marine Laboratory. "I found that nations with more people have reefs with far fewer large fish because as the number of people increases, so does demand for seafood. Fishermen typically go after the biggest fish first, but shift to smaller species once the bigger ones become depleted. In some areas with large human populations, my study revealed that only a few small predatory fish remain."
Stallings said that although several factors -- including loss of coral reef habitats -- contributed to the general patterns, careful examination of the data suggests overfishing as the most likely reason for the disappearance of large predatory fishes across the region. He pointed to the Nassau grouper as a prime example. Once abundant throughout the Caribbean, Nassau grouper have virtually disappeared from many Caribbean nearshore areas and are endangered throughout their range.
"Large predatory fish such as groupers and sharks are vitally important in marine food webs," Stallings said. "However, predicting the consequence of their loss is difficult because of the complexity of predator-prey interactions. You can't replace a 10-foot shark with a one-foot grouper and expect there to be no effect on reef communities. Shifts in abundance to smaller predators could therefore have surprising and unanticipated effects. One such effect may be the ability of non-native species to invade Caribbean reefs."
A case in point, said Stallings, is the ongoing invasion by Pacific lionfish, which were introduced by aquarium releases.
"Lionfish are minor players on their native Pacific reefs, yet they are undergoing a population explosion and overeating small fishes in the greater Caribbean region," said Professor Mark Hixon of Oregon State University, Stallings' doctoral advisor at OSU. "Preliminary evidence suggests that lionfish are less invasive where large predatory native fishes are abundant, such as in marine reserves," Hixon said.
The study also demonstrates the power of volunteer and community research efforts by non-scientists. Stallings used data from the Reef Environmental Education Foundation's (REEF) online database, which contains fish sightings documented by trained volunteer SCUBA divers, including more than 38,000 surveys spanning a 15-year period.
"Chris was completely undaunted by the lack of fisheries data and essentially adopted the 'Audubon Christmas Bird Count' approach in a marine system to find strong evidence for a native fisheries effect," said Felicia Coleman, director of the FSU Coastal and Marine Laboratory and Stallings' postdoctoral advisor.
Given that about half the world's populations live near coastlines and that the world population is growing, demands for ocean-derived protein will continue to increase, Stallings warned. He said meeting such demands while retaining healthy coral reefs may require multiple strategies, including implementation of marine reserves, finding alternative sources of protein, and increased efforts to implement family-planning strategies in densely populated areas.
Yahoo News 5 May 09;
HELSINKI (AFP) – Finnish conservation biologists said Tuesday fewer pups of the rare Saimaa seal were born this winter compared to 2008, a move which sparked the government to promise tighter fishing restrictions.
Finland's biggest lake, Lake Saimaa in eastern Finland covers 4,400 square kilometres and is home to some 260 Saimaa seals, according to government figures from 2008.
In this spring's seal cubs calculations only 43 cubs were found, which is eight less than a year ago said Metsaehallitus, the state agency, which looks after state-owned land and water areas.
"This is alarming because we had two warm winters with small number of pups and now we had another small age group. This will slow the growth of the population in the future," biologist Tero Sipilae from Metsaehallitus told AFP.
The decline in the number of pups born may seem small, but up to 30 percent of the cubs die during their first year mainly because they get tangled up in fishing nets when they learn to swim and fish.
The seals feature on the European Union's endangered species list as it has suffered from man's action such as pollution in the 1960's and nowadays from warmer winters and dangerous fishing equipment.
Metsaehallitus data shows the seal population increased from 189 in 1990 to 280 in 2005, although that number fell to 260 last year.
Environmental organisations such as the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation have criticised the government for not imposing tighter fishing restrictions in April-June in areas where seals live.
The ministry of agriculture and forestry said it would start to prepare a ban on fishing nets in Saimaa and the law would come into force next year.
"We will soon present a change in the fishing law, which would enable banning fishing nets to protect the Saimaa seal," Sirkka Anttila, the minister of agriculture and forestry, said in a separate statement.
Aim is to protect species that feed on invasive seaweeds that are overtaking corals
Rob Perez, Honolulu Advertiser 5 May 09;
Local fishers may soon be prevented from taking three families of popular reef fish from a small section of the Maui coastline as a way to help the beleaguered corals in that area recover.
The Department of Land and Natural Resources board recently approved a ban on the taking of parrotfish, surgeonfish and chubs, along with sea urchins, along a roughly one-mile section of the coast in North Ka'anapali.
Members of all three herbivorous fish families and the urchins are important grazers of seaweed, which has overtaken much of the coral along that section of the shoreline.
The ban, if approved by Gov. Linda Lingle, would mark the first time the state has adopted protections for specific species as a broader strategy for restoring the health of a reef in a particular area.
"This is a very proactive approach," said Cynthia Hunter, an assistant professor of marine biology at the University of Hawai'i-Manoa. If it proves effective, as has been the case in other places outside Hawai'i, the approach could be used elsewhere locally where similar conditions exist, Hunter said.
The ban would apply to the nearshore waters from Keka'a Point to Honokowai Beach Park, and that section would become the Kahekili Herbivore Fisheries Management Area.
The new marine management plan still must be approved by Lingle before it takes effect. Her spokesman yesterday said the plan's rules would go through the regular review process once received from the board.
feeding also banned
Russell Sparks, education specialist with the agency's Division of Aquatic Resources' Maui office, said the coral in the affected area has declined by about 50 percent over the past 14 years, and the fish population there also is not at the level it should be, when compared with similar environments.
The decline in parrotfish, surgeonfish, chubs and sea urchins has contributed to the surge in invasive seaweeds that are overtaking the corals, and the aim of the new program is to protect the fish that are critical to keeping the seaweed, or algae, in check, according to Sparks, who oversaw the development of the new management plan. He said other factors, such as land-based pollution, also have contributed to the degradation of the reefs.
The Kahekili plan also would entail a ban on people feeding the fish — similar to what is in place at Hanauma Bay on O'ahu.
A feeding ban is important, especially in an area with many tourists, so that the fish don't get full on artificial food and will continue their natural role of feeding on seaweed, Sparks said.
Sparks said the proposal has been about two years in the making and differs from other approaches the state previously has taken to protect marine areas.
In some instances, the state banned the taking of any marine life from an area, mostly because the area is considered special, such as Hanauma Bay, he said. In other instances, the state created protections for certain species because of their dwindling numbers or to resolve conflicts among ocean users.
But this is the first time the state is attempting to outlaw the taking of specific species to achieve the broader goal of restoring the reef's health, Sparks said. "This approach we're doing is really ... unique," he said.
hawaiians' rights
The strategy has not been without controversy.
At a public hearing in Lahaina in February, the department was criticized for singling out fishing practices.
Many opponents said they believe that land-based pollution, overdevelopment and general overuse of the reefs are bigger problems affecting coral condition than overfishing. Concerns about restricting Native Hawaiian harvesting rights also were raised at the hearing.
"As a Native Hawaiian (who) is of this ahupua'a, we have rights to gather within our ahupua'a at any time for any reason to sustain and better our health and living conditions in any way we see fit," said Lahaina resident Ui'lani Kapu in written testimony.
But scientists, fishers and others voiced support for the plan.
"Protecting herbivorous fish populations in an area off Kahekili should result in an increase in fish populations, an increase in fish size, a decrease in algae growth and a healthier reef ecosystem overall," wrote Alan Friedlander, a UH zoology professor.
The proposal was approved unanimously by the DLNR board, Sparks said. Violations, if deemed criminal, would be classified as petty misdemeanors subject to fines. A first-time offense, for instance, would result in a fine of not less than $100.
Because the reefs of the main Hawaiian Islands generally have been on the decline, scientists and others have urged the state to be more aggressive in using marine protected areas and other policies to help safeguard and restore the health of the nearshore ecosystems.
Christian Spillmann Yahoo News 5 May 09;
STRASBOURG (AFP) – The European Parliament voted Tuesday to endorse an EU-wide ban on seal products in protest at commercial hunting methods, sparking a threat from Canada to take action at the World Trade Organisation.
The move, backed by much of the European public and animal rights groups, was approved by 550 votes to 49 at the parliament in Strasbourg. The ban will enter force for the next commercial seal hunt season in 2010.
The decision to reject seal products came on the eve of a visit to Prague by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to launch free trade talks with the European Union.
The Canadian government maintains that the 350-year-old hunt is crucial for some 6,000 North Atlantic fishermen who rely on it for up to 35 percent of their annual income.
Ottawa authorized the slaughter of 338,000 seals this year, insisting the hunt does not threaten the species. But a slump in pelt prices has meant fewer hunters on ice floes off Canada's Atlantic coast.
"If the EU imposes a trade ban on seal products it must contain an exemption for any country, like Canada, that has strict guidelines in place for humane and sustainable sealing practices," Trade Minister Stockwell Day said.
"If there is no such acceptable exemption, Canada will challenge the ban at the World Trade Organisation," he said in a statement.
Canada hopes that requiring training on how to humanely slaughter seals, legislating standards for seal products and taking measures to safeguard the species will silence hunt critics.
The EU is Canada's second-largest trading partner. Their trade is worth about 25 billion euros (33 billion dollars) annually, with the seal trade accounting for around 4.2 million euros.
"After many years of campaigning by European citizens I welcome the regulation which bans seal products from entering or being traded in the European Union," EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said in a statement.
"By upholding the highest standards the new legislation addresses EU citizens' concerns with regard to the cruel hunting methods of seals," he said.
The commission said the ban, already endorsed by the bloc's executive body, would eliminate disparate national rules. But it underlined it would allow trade in seal products derived from hunts traditionally conducted by Inuit and other indigenous communities and which contribute to their subsistence.
EU members Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Slovenia have already banned or announced their intention to ban products from the commercial hunt.
The EU ban -- on pelts, used for making bags, hats and gloves, and meat, oil, organs and fat -- adds to those announced by the United States and Mexico, two of Canada's main trading partners.
It does not hit traditional hunters or hunting conducted on a small scale and controlled under national legislation -- notably in Britain, Finland and Sweden -- in an effort to protect fish stocks hit by seals.
Animal rights groups hailed the vote as a "historic victory".
"The European Union has acted on behalf of its citizens, and its decision will save millions of seals from a horrible fate," said Mark Glover, director of Humane Society International.
"The parliament has hammered the final nail in the coffin of the sealing industry's market in the EU," said Lesley O'Donnell, from the International Fund for Animal Welfare.
Europe votes to ban seal product trade
Canada threatens to appeal to WTO after move aimed at drastic reduction in annual seal cull
Ian Traynor, guardian.co.uk 5 May 09;
Europe moved today to halt the clubbing to death of hundreds of thousands of seals every year, when MEPs voted overwhelmingly to ban trading in seal products, hoping that the collapse of the market will drastically reduce the massacre.
The decision to outlaw virtually all trade in seal products was directed mainly at Canada, where the yearly cull kills around 300,000 seals, a practice condemned by many as barbaric.
Canada, which exports several million dollars worth of seal products to the EU, is threatening to take Brussels to the World Trade Organisation because of the ban, which still needs to be endorsed by the EU's 27 national governments. But that support is guaranteed as EU governments agreed the text with the European parliament.
While 90 MEPs voted against the ban or abstained, 550 voted in favour. The trade will be stopped next year.
"This is a political issue that now has its time," said Arlene McCarthy, the Labour MEP. "After a 40-year campaign, Europe has a chance to introduce a ban in all 27 states."
National bans on commercial trading in seal products are already in place in 30 countries including the US, the Netherlands and Italy. Italy is still said to be one of the biggest European importers of seal pelts.
Seal products are also found in Omega 3 'fish oil' pills, leather goods and meat from the Arctic.
The vote came as an EU-Canada summit convened in Praguewhere the Ottawa government was expected to complain about the ban. Norway has also threatened to take the EU to the WTO.
"The ban does nothing to improve the welfare of hunted seals but sets a dangerous precedent by ignoring WTO rules," said the International Fur Trade Federation.
Its chairman, Andreas Lenhart, said: "MEPs have rushed through bad legislation to garner what they think will be public appeal just before they are up for re-election [next month]."
But opponents of the ban are relatively rare in Europe.
"Cruel and inhumane seal hunting is unacceptable and an EU measure is the best way we can help to end it around the world," said Caroline Flint, the minister for Europe. "It also shows how we can achieve more acting together than alone."
Almost one million seals are culled every year worldwide. McCarthy said the Canadians had slaughtered less than a quarter of the number of seals this year compared to last because trading bans were destroying the market for seal products.
Inuit communities in the Arctic were exempted from the new rules. The marketing of seal products would still be allowed from "hunts traditionally conducted by Inuit and other indigenous communities and which contribute to their subsistence".
Lesley O'Donnell, the EU director of the International Fund for Animal Welfare, said today's vote "hammered the final nail in the coffin of the sealing industry's market in the EU. The world is uniting in opposition to commercial sea hunts. A complete collapse of Canada's commercial seal hunt may now be inevitable."
Yahoo News 5 May 09;
CAPE TOWN (AFP) – Hundreds of thousands of South African bees are at risk from a disease sweeping through hives and posing a threat to fruit and vegetable farming in the country, an industry expert said Tuesday.
The only way to rid bee populations of American Foul Brood disease is by burning the infected hives. However, as the only country to avoid the disease for the past 150 years, South Africa has no quarantine regulations for insects.
"It is extremely serious because it is a very contagious disease ... not only for honey but for agriculture. We need to use bees for pollinating fruit trees and vegetable crops," said John Moodie, chairman of the Bee Industry Organisation.
The exceptionally contagious spore-forming bacterium, never before seen in sub-Saharan Africa, has broken out in the southern tip of the Western Cape province.
Some 200 hives are known to be infected already, with about 60,000 bees per hive, and the industry is awaiting assistance from the agricultural department to start burning hives.
"New laws have to be promulgated, it's taking too much time. We need logistical inputs, money. Every day creates a bigger problem," Moodie told AFP, warning the disease could spread throughout southern Africa.
"We need those regulations so we can start taking action".
The Western Cape's key fruit export industry relies on between 30,000 and 40,000 beehives to pollinate their fruit trees.
It is suspected the disease entered the country through infected honey, which by law has to be irradiated to destroy spores when it enters the country.
The disease poses no risks to humans.
Tilde Herrera, PlanetArk 6 May 09;
Tesco is charging ahead with its plans to slap a carbon label on all of its private label products to denote the amount of greenhouse gas emissions it takes to produce each item.
The U.K.-based retailer said on Friday it would include the labels on its Tesco-branded toilet paper and kitchen rolls beginning in late summer. The Carbon Reduction Label accounts for all emissions generated by each stage of the product's lifecycle; Tesco must reduce emissions or lose the right to use the label.
Not surprisingly, the company's recycled toilet paper comes with a smaller carbon footprint when compared to its conventional counterpart: 1.1g of carbon dioxide emissions for each sheet of recycled toilet paper versus 1.8g for Tesco's standard roll.
The company said the emissions savings can be traced to an integrated tissue mill that can turn waste paper into tissue paper in one place in order to achieve greater energy efficiency. The company's kitchen rolls, or paper towels, made from recycled content also achieved a 15 percent smaller carbon footprint.
The company's labeling program began a year ago with 20 products in four categories -- light bulbs, laundry detergent, potatoes and orange juice -- and now rings in at roughly 100 items.
Tesco NonBio liquid detergent with carbon label
The move is part of a collaboration with The Carbon Trust, a government-funded entity that has already worked with companies such as Walkers, Boots and innocent Drinks to test the carbon label pilot program. Coca Cola, Continental Clothing, Halifax, Cadbury, Marshalls and British Sugar are among the companies that have pursued carbon labels for their products and services.
According to Tesco, consumer surveys indicate more than 60 percent seek products with low carbon footprints if they don't have to sacrifice cost or convenience.
Jon R. Luoma of Yale Environment 360, guardian.co.uk 5 May 09;
The scrubby jatropha tree has been touted as a wonder biofuel with unlimited potential. But questions are now emerging as to whether widespread jatropha cultivation is really feasible or whether it will simply displace badly-needed food crops in the developing world.
The widespread publicity surrounding a seeming wonder-plant called Jatropha curcas began in earnest in the mid-2000s. A good-news story, it went like this: In the mildly toxic, oval-shaped, oily seeds of this hardy, shrubby tree was a near-miraculous source of biofuel. Since jatropha could grow on arid, barren lands, cultivating it would avoid displacing food crops such as corn and soybeans — a major drawback of so-called first generation biofuels. The world's thirst for combustible fuels could be slaked, according to the buzz surrounding jatropha, with energy harvested from wastelands rather than from fertile fields.
Native to Central America and well-adapted to the tropics and subtropics, jatropha seemed a boon for the very places with some of the highest rates of poverty and plenty of hot, dry lands: the global south, from Latin America to Africa to Asia. Not only was the cultivation of jatropha supposed to absorb more CO2 from the atmosphere than it released, but the miracle tree could also stabilize and restore degraded soils. That's surely why Scientific American in 2007 called jatropha "green gold in a shrub," a plant that "seems to offer all the benefits of biofuels without the pitfalls."
Fast forward a couple of years. By 2009, governments from China to Brazil, along with several major biofuel companies, had planted — or vowed to plant — millions of acres of jatropha. In India alone, the government has announced plans to subsidize an intensive program to plant jatropha for biofuels on 27 million acres of "wastelands" — an area roughly the size of Switzerland. And the jatropha push is on in other countries such as Myanmar, Malaysia, Malawi, and Brazil.
Despite all this, however, it's not at all clear that jatropha will ever be the green gold it's been cracked up to be. In fact, no one yet seems to know for sure if the kind of large-scale jatropha plantations that would make a real dent in world fuel demand can actually be productive, while also avoiding the problems associated with growing corn, sugar cane, and soybeans for biofuel.
Today, most jatropha grown for biofuels is cultivated on plots of less than 12 acres and is primarily used locally. A global biofuels market for jatropha
is only just beginning to emerge. One of the handful of companies involved in large-scale jatropha production is D1 Oils, a U.K.-based biofuels technology company that says it already has more than a half-million acres under cultivation, much of it in India. A 2008 report by jatropha producers said that 242 cultivation projects existed globally, growing the tree on 2.2 million acres; by comparison, Brazil alone grows sugarcane for ethanol on 7.2 million acres of land.
A key issue surrounding jatropha is the productivity of the tree in the dry, degraded lands on which it is said to thrive. Rob Bailis, an assistant professor at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, along with Yale Ph.D. candidate Jennifer Baka, recently launched the first detailed "life cycle" environment assessment of jatropha as a biofuel. Although their study is in its early stages, Bailis notes that it's already clear that, while jatropha can indeed grow on lands with minimal water and poor nutrition, "if you plant trees in a marginal area, and all they do is just not die, it doesn't mean you're going to get a lot of oil from them."
He says evidence suggests that the tree will grow far more productively on higher quality land with more rainfall or irrigation. Indeed, even executives at D1 Oils warn against overestimating jatropha's potential to produce economically viable yields on severely degraded lands.
"If you grow jatropha in marginal conditions, you can expect marginal yields," says Vincent Volckaert, the Africa regional director for D1.
And there's the rub, says Bailis. "If you grow it in better agricultural conditions, all the alarm bells go off as you get into the same food-versus-fuel debate we've seen with [biofuel from] corn."
Although it may still be early in the jatropha story, some of those alarm bells have already sounded.
Consider India's great push to plant jatropha. According to the Indian environmental group, Navdanya, government foresters have drained rice paddies in order to plant jatropha in the poor and mostly tribal state of Chhattisgarh. As early as mid-2007, protests broke out in the mostly desert state of Rajasthan over a government scheme to reclassify village commons lands — widely used for grazing livestock — as "wastelands" targeted for biofuel production, primarily jatropha.
On Mindanao, the second-largest of the Philippine islands, protests erupted in late 2008, with indigenous leaders insisting that jatropha plantations had begun to displace needed crops of rice, corn, bananas, and root vegetables.
A striking symbol of jatropha's pitfalls can be found in Myanmar, formerly Burma. Late in 2005, Myanmar's military dictatorship — newly enamored with what's been called "the biofuel tree " — ordered all of that nation's states and other political divisions to plant about a half-million acres each. In a predominantly agrarian country where child malnutrition is rampant, entire plantations have sprung up where food crops once grew. Under the threat of imprisonment, households have been forced to buy seed and plant jatropha in backyard gardens. Human rights groups report that teachers and their pupils, along with medical and government workers, have all been pressed into service to plant jatropha.
Yet according to scattered stories that have leaked out of a country generally closed to the foreign news media, the same government that infamously bungled its response to a devastating May 2008 typhoon did not have the foresight to build adequate infrastructure to mill the jatropha seeds or process them into biofuel. The seeds — grown at the expense of food crops — were left to simply rot on the ground.
It's not all bad news. In the West African nation of Mali, on the southern edge of the Sahara, jatropha had long been grown as a sort of living fence to keep wildlife from crops, and sometimes as a source of handmade soap. In recent years, often with the help of nonprofit groups like the Denmark-based charity Folkecenter, local jatropha processing mills have appeared in hundreds of villages, providing fuel for lamps, cookstoves, and generators. The biofuel is not only cheaper than conventional oil and diesel, but it is available during rainy seasons, when impassable roads can block conventional fuel delivery. Even the solid "press cake" left over after the oil is squeezed out of the seeds has value as either an organic fertilizer or, if processed to neutralize the natural toxicity, animal feed.
But for jatropha to reach wonder-plant status — to make even a meaningful dent in a world that presently consumes 80 million barrels of oil every day — the tree would have to be grown on a scale far beyond the village level. Jatropha's potential was recently underscored by highly publicized jet test flights using a mix of jatropha and other biofuels. Boeing reported that at altitudes where fuels must last hours at sub-zero temperatures, the jatropha/biofuel mix not only performed well, but actually had a higher freezing point than conventional jet fuel. Jatropha fuel also contains more energy per gallon, meaning less fuel weight has to be lifted off the ground. In March, Boeing officials told a Congressional hearing that they were "very confident" that jet fuels from plants such as jatropha could power their planes in a low-carbon future.
In an early 2008 test, Virgin Airlines flew a jet from London to Amsterdam powered with a dollop — about five percent — of a similar biofuel, this one made from coconut oil. Never mind that the British magazine, New Scientist, calculated that it could take 150,000 coconuts to fully power even that short flight. Virgin CEO Richard Branson suggested that jatropha grown on arid soils could be the ticket for a green-fueled aviation industry, whereupon New Scientist calculated that it would take land twice the size of France to grow enough jatropha to power the world's jet fleet. (Dramatic boosts in yields could improve that equation.)
If jatropha is to be grown on an industrial scale, the plant will need to be tamed and cultivated, and its oil yields vastly enhanced through conventional plant breeding or genetic manipulation. A San Diego start-up company, SG Biofuels, says it has amassed the world's most complete library of jatropha genetic material and, with a cadre of scientists on its staff, believes it is on the way to quadrupling oil yields from 200 gallons per acre to 800 gallons per acre. A comparable boost in yields came after rubber trees were domesticated.
Even if enterprises like SG and D1 Oils can push the genetic envelope enough to make jatropha profitable, will the world actually be able to benefit from growing and processing the plant on a large scale? The jury's still out. Yale's Bailis says his life-cycle study still hasn't established that jatropha biofuel will ever be "carbon positive," meaning that growing the plant absorbs more CO2 from the air than it releases. He says he suspects that it can be, but he also points out that if cultivating the plant means leveling forests or plowing up native vegetation, large volumes of carbon would be released, possibly canceling out any benefits.
Whether jatropha will turn out to be the wonder plant it was originally touted to be will depend a great deal on how and where it is grown — an issue that must be resolved by scientists, businesses, and governments. "Whether it turns out to be a positive or a negative is going to depend a great deal on how it's addressed at the policy level," Bailis says.
The best outcome might be to slow down the jatropha steamroller and let science sort out whether it can be grown on a mass scale in ways that make it preferable to food-based biofuels. If not, it may turn out that the world will still have to wait for a second generation of truly viable biofuels.
• From Yale Environment 360, part of Guardian Environment Network
Timothy Gardner, PlanetArk 6 May 09;
NEW YORK - U.S. President Barack Obama's administration issued a draft rule on Tuesday aiming to cut greenhouse gasses emitted by biofuels but confirming his predecessor's target for production of corn-based ethanol.
The rule seeks to make production of U.S. corn-based ethanol more efficient and increase production of advanced biofuels. Corn ethanol has been criticized for contributing to higher food prices and indirectly causing greenhouse gas emissions by forcing forests and other lands to be burned abroad to create farmland.
Obama also called on the heads of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and the Department of Agriculture to chair a group to identify policies to develop advanced biofuels and increase use of "flex fuel" cars that can run on gasoline or fuel that is mostly ethanol.
Obama said in a release that the country must invest in clean energy for new jobs and to reduce dependence on foreign oil. "Through American ingenuity and determination, we can and will succeed," he said.
The new rule, issued by the EPA, confirms the schedule of the 2007 Renewable Fuels Standard, signed by former President George W. Bush, which calls for the blending of 36 billion gallons (136 billion liters) per year of biofuels into gasoline by 2022.
It calls for a maximum blending of 15 billion gallons of corn and grain-based ethanol annually into gasoline by 2015.
It also confirms the target of blending 16 billion gallons per year by 2022 of cellulosic ethanol made from substances such as switchgrass and agricultural waste. Cellulosic ethanol has shown promise as a fuel lower in carbon emissions and one that will not raise food prices, but is not yet made in commercial amounts.
"Corn-based ethanol is a bridge to the next generation of biofuels," EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said in a teleconference about the draft rule.
The rule aims to spur traditional bio-refineries that make corn ethanol to run on cleaner fuels like biomass instead of fossil fuels. That is expected to lower life-cycle emissions from corn-based ethanol.
The 1,004-page "Regulation of Fuels and Fuel Additives: Changes to Renewable Fuel Standard Program" will be published in the Federal Register and open for public comments.
Jackson said the comments would help the government find the best way to measure global warming pollution from biofuels before issuing final rules.
INTERAGENCY GROUP
The interagency group will seek to ease transportation of identify policies to develop advanced biofuels and transport them to market.
Obama said that nearly $790 million from the stimulus bill will accelerate advanced biofuels research and development. He asked Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to speed up financing opportunities, including loan guarantees and funding, under the 2008 Farm Law to develop bio-refineries and demonstration-scale plants.
The draft rule mandates greenhouse gas cuts for alternative fuels. It measures any carbon dioxide emissions from "indirect land use change." Those include any global warming pollution given off when U.S. production of crops like corn for biofuels displaces other crops, pushing farmers around the world to burn down forests and grasslands to grow them.
Many corn ethanol producers oppose such measurements saying advances in seeds and fertilizers cut the need for more land to grow corn for more ethanol.
Some environmentalists applauded the issuing of the rule.
"The release of the rule is an important first step in understanding greenhouse gas emissions from biofuels," Britt Lundgren, an agricultural policy specialist with the Environmental Defense Fund, said by telephone.
But Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, said the draft did not go far enough and risked forming rules based on far-off future projections.
(Editing by Marguerita Choy)
Robert Evans, PlanetArk 5 May 09;
GENEVA - Experts and officials from some 150 countries started talks on Monday on banning production of nine chemicals considered potentially dangerous but still used in farming and for other commercial purposes.
If agreement is reached at the week-long meeting, under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the nine will join a list of 12 other so-called persistent organic pollutants, or POPS, long targeted for elimination.
"The risks posed by such chemicals are profound, and these toxic substances leave chemical footprints around the globe," said UNEP executive director Achim Steiner, who will be watching over the Geneva gathering.
The newly-targetted chemicals include products -- known normally under their scientific names -- that are widely used for pesticides and are also used in the manufacture of flame retardants and similar items.
The original 12 POPS -- dubbed the "dirty dozen" and widely blamed for damaging human nervous systems, causing cancer and disrupting the development of young children -- were listed under a 2001 international pact called the Stockholm Convention.
But as these have been removed from production lines, focus has switched to extending the banned list to other highly toxic chemicals that take many years, often decades, to degrade into less dangerous forms.
SPECIAL RISKS
Among the new ones to be considered this week are Alpha hexachlorocyclohexane, Hexabromidyphenyl ether, Chlordecone, Hexabromobiphenyl, Lindane, Pentachlorobenzene and Perfluorooctane, according to UNEP.
UNEP says these, like the "dirty dozen", pose special risks to young people, farmers, pregnant women and the unborn, and to remote communities like those in the Arctic where Inuit women and polar bears have been found to have large POP doses in their own bodies.
The pollutant chemicals can evaporate and travel long distances through air and water to regions far from their original source and accumulate in the fatty tissues of both humans and animals.
A thaw in the Arctic linked to global warming may allow some of the chemicals, long-trapped under sea ice, to evaporate into the atmosphere and spread further around the polar region, an expert said on Monday.
Agreement at the Geneva meeting, which ends on May 8, could mark a major step towards creating a healthier and more sustainable green economy for the world, said Steiner, while lifting a health threat to millions of people.
(Editing by Jon Hemming)
Alister Doyle, PlanetArk 5 May 09;
OSLO - A thaw of the Arctic linked to global warming may slow a drive to get rid of industrial chemicals that are harming indigenous people and wildlife, an expert said on Monday.
About 150 nations are meeting in Geneva this week to consider adding nine chemicals, including pesticides and flame retardants, to a "Dirty Dozen" banned by a 2001 UN pact partly inspired by worries about the fragile Arctic environment.
But an Arctic melt may be complicating the clean-up even though levels of some of the "dirty dozen" chemicals are falling in the region, said Lars-Otto Reiersen, Executive Secretary of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP).
"There's some good news and some bad news," he told Reuters.
The shrinking of summer sea ice may allow some of the dirty dozen persistent organic pollutants (POPs), long trapped under sea ice, to evaporate into the atmosphere and so spread further around the polar region, he said.
"Climate change may ... delay the impact in the environment of policy actions against POPs," according to an AMAP report due to be presented in Geneva on Tuesday. Arctic sea ice shrank in September 2007 to the smallest since satellite records began.
And some chemicals trapped in glaciers or permafrost may get washed out by a melt, blamed by the UN Climate Panel mainly on greenhouse gases released by burning fossil fuels.
LIGHTNING
Lightning may trigger more fires because global warming is likely to make some forests drier. That could release PCBs, one of the dirty dozen industrial chemicals used in paints or electric transformers, trapped in forest soils.
Among dirty dozen chemicals in decline in recent years were the pesticide DDT and PCBs, but levels of newer chemicals such as brominated flame retardants were rising.
The 12 have been linked to cancers, birth defects and brain damage. The Arctic is vulnerable to POPs, swept north by prevailing winds or currents from Europe, North America and Asia, partly because the chemicals lodge in fatty tissues.
High levels of POPs have been found in the breast milk of Inuit women. And animals such as whales, seals or polar bears depend on an extremely fat-rich diet to help them stay warm.
Reiersen said levels of man-made chemicals in the Arctic were still high enough to damage people and animals. Oslo-based AMAP is run by the eight nations with Arctic territory.
Among good news, POPs levels were falling in the blood of some Arctic peoples. But that was mostly because of a change in diets towards food bought in shops, away from traditional hunts.
Chemicals on the rise in the Arctic include brominated flame retardants, used in products such as mattresses or computers, some pesticides and PFOs, found in goods ranging from electrical equipment to fire-fighting foams, Reiersen said.
"Some are under discussion in Geneva and some are not," he said, adding that some flame retardants and PFOs might be banned. Among those not on the list were the pesticide endosulfan, which AMAP says partly meets criteria as a POP.
(Editing by Jon Hemming)
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