Indonesia forest fires fan regional haze concern

Reuters 15 Jun 09;

JAKARTA, June 15 (Reuters) - Indonesia may experience more severe forest fires this year because of an extended dry season, officials said on Monday, raising the prospect of choking smoke blowing across neighbouring states.

As well as being unhealthy, the smog can cause major economic disruption costing the tourism, transport and farming sectors billions of dollars.

Spurred on by the 1997-98 fires, Southeast Asian countries signed the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution in 2002, but Indonesia has yet to ratify the pact.

Areas such as Sumatra and Borneo regularly suffer from forest fires, but risks appear to have risen with the return of the El Nino weather pattern this year. [ID:nSP425375].

"The dry season (in Riau) will peak at the end of June to July which may increase hotspots and with wind coming from Australia to Asia, the haze could travel to Malaysia and Singapore," said Blucer Doloksaribu, head of the meteorology agency in Riau's provincial capital of Pekanbaru.

Riau, along with other parts of Sumatra, frequently suffers from forest fires.

Malaysia has already been suffering from haze this year and visibility was cut in the capital Kuala Lumpur last week while air quality in several parts of the country was deemed unhealthy.

Bustar Maitar, forest campaigner for Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said the number of fires appeared to be decreasing, but warned an anticipated long dry season could increase the numbers this year.

He also said the risk of forest fires was also being increased by the land clearing practices linked to some plantation firms and pulp-paper firms.

"Burning forests is still the cheapest way for companies to clear land although the government has prohibited it," he said.

Indonesian data showed the number of hotspots in Sumatra based on satellite surveillance had fallen to 28 as of Sunday from 99 last week after rain.

But on Borneo island the number of hot spots rose to 69 from 17 last week.

"If the weather remains dry, they (hot spots in Borneo) will gradually increase just like in Sumatra and will cause haze," Endarwin, head of extreme weather at Indonesia's meteorology agency said.

The agency has so far not issued recommendations to stop flights because visibility was still above minimum level of 1,000 metres (3,280 ft), he said.

Maitar of Greenpeace criticised a government move earlier in the year to end a moratorium on allowing palm oil plantations and pulp companies to operate in peatlands.

Environmentalists are particularly concerned over an increasing trend towards converting peatland forests.

Once these areas are drained, peat soil is highly flammable, producing more smoke and carbon emissions than other soil types. (Reporting by Fitri Wulandari and Telly Nathalia; Editing by Ed Davies and Jeremy Laurence)

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Visibility Improves As Haze Eases Up

Bernama 15 May 09;

KUALA LUMPUR, June 15 (Bernama) -- The hazy conditions in the country has improved, resulting in better visibility, as 39 locations registered good Air Pollutant Index (API) readings while 11 others recorded moderate readings as of 11am today.

According to the Department of Environment (DOE) website, API reading for Port Klang, a leading sea route to the country, had also improved from 67 yesterday to 54 today.

Putrajaya, Cheras, Shah Alam and Petaling Jaya which recorded moderate
and unhealthy API readings yesterday, improved to 51, 57, 45 and 44 respectively.

A 0-50 API means good quality air, 51-100 is "moderate", 101-200 means
"unhealthy" and 201-300 means very unhealthy while 300 and above is
termed hazardous.

Bintulu in Sarawak was among few places that recorded a slight drop in the quality of air after recording 63 API compared with 56 yesterday while conditions in Miri improved from 76 yesterday to 35 today.

Meanwhile, a Malaysian Meteorological Department spokesman said visibility in all areas improved to more than 10km except for Petaling Jaya, Melaka and Butterworth, Penang which recorded eight to nine kilometers.

Seven hotspots were identified in West Malaysia, namely one each in Selangor, Kedah, Perak, Kelantan and three in Pahang while Sarawak recorded six hotspots, Sumatera (99) and Kalimantan (11). No hotspots were found in Sabah.
BERNAMA

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Best of our wild blogs: 15 Jun 09

Mangroves at Noordin Beach, Pulau Ubin
from wild shores of singapore blog and lazy on ubin and durians

Why is the juvenile bee-eater not fed bees?
on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog

The usual Monday crab
on the annotated budak blog

Monday Morgue: 15th June 2009
on the Lazy Lizard's Tales blog

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Non-recyclable waste in recycling bins

What rubbish
A Straits Times check of 80 recycling bins finds non-recyclable waste in all of them
Yeo Sam Jo, Straits Times 15 Jun 09;

FROM Orchard Road to HDB estates, recycling bins seem to be everywhere, underlining the country's push for a greener city. But what some people throw into them is a different matter.

The Straits Times peeked into 80 recycling bins in public areas and found that all of them contained some rubbish that could not be recycled.

The 'foreign items' included decomposed chicken briyani, soggy tissue paper, prawn shells and chicken bones.

There was even a used condom in a bin in Jalan Teck Whye.

Many bins were also used as ashtrays, while others were foul-smelling and attracted pests like fruit flies and ants.

While the average amount of recyclables collected from each bin in HDB estates has gone up - from 65kg per month in 2007 to 103kg per month last year - the National Environment Agency (NEA) said that about one-fifth of all waste deposited in recycling bins could not be recycled.

The Straits Times found the same problem when it followed two workers from public waste collector Colex Holdings on one of their rounds.

Mr A. Palaniamah, 53, and Mr Jimmol Buntol, 35, start at 7am every day, driving around Jurong emptying the contents of recycling bins into their truck.

Their job would be easier if they did not have to pick out and discard unwanted items such as smelly food scraps from the lot.

They are resigned to the chore.

'It can get quite smelly and unpleasant, but it is something we must still do,' said Mr Palaniamah. 'Anyway we are used to it.'

Another thing they have to do is sort through the contents and group them correctly. Plastic cups, for example, often find their way into the bins for metal cans.

The recyclables have to be sorted and put into the right compartments in the truck.

The duo empty about 35 sets of bins each day before delivering the contents to a recycling plant in Geylang.

That many people treat recycling bins as ordinary rubbish bins puts a dent in NEA's recycling target. It hopes to achieve a 70 per cent overall recycling rate by 2030. Last year, 56 per cent of Singapore's household and industrial waste was recycled, up from 40 per cent in 2000.

An NEA spokesman explained that throwing waste such as leftover food and drinks into the bins contaminates the recyclable materials and renders them non-recyclable.

It also increases the cost of maintaining the bins, which have to be washed more often when they get dirty.

There are approximately 3,800 recycling bins across the island. Those in HDB blocks are provided and managed by four public waste collectors.

Colex Holdings, for example, manages the bins in Jurong, Bukit Batok and Boon Lay. The other three collectors are Veolia Environmental Services, 800 Super Waste Management and SembWaste.

The NEA provides the rest of the public area bins, such as those outside MRT stations, at the airport and along Orchard Road. Private buildings such as condominiums and shopping malls manage their own recycling bins.

To prevent them from overflowing and attracting pests, the bins are cleared weekly. Some heavily used ones, such as those along Orchard Road or near MRT stations, are cleared twice a week.

In contrast to ignorant or inconsiderate users, there are those who conscientiously recycle their waste.

Customer service manager Goy Hsu Mae and her husband started recycling two years ago.

'We try to recycle everything we use,' said Ms Goy, 32. 'From jam jars to Yakult bottles, we just try not to waste them.'

The couple bag their household garbage according to material - plastic, metal and glass. Every month, they deposit the bags in the recycling bins at nearby Holland Village.

'Sometimes we see stuff like dirty tissue and leftover food in the bins,' said Ms Goy. 'Why can't these people be more considerate?'

But she is not giving up on the habit.

'It's a matter of being conscious of the waste we are creating,' she said. 'If we can reduce our own waste and turn it into something useful, why not?'

Cans and cannots of recycling
ACCEPTABLE

# Paper: Newspapers, envelopes, magazines, books, brochures, pamphlets, carpark coupons, carton boxes, cereal boxes

# Metal: Cans or containers made of metal such as soft drink cans, beer cans, milk powder tins, food cans

# Plastic: Bottles or containers made of plastic such as detergent containers, milk containers, soft drink bottles, plastic bags

# Glass: Jars and drink bottles

# Others: Clean clothing

UNACCEPTABLE

# Paper: Cardboard or paper contaminated by food waste (for example, pizza boxes), used tissue paper, sweet wrappers

# Plastic: Styrofoam, disposable plastic cups and containers, biscuit box liners

# Glass: Light bulbs and window glass

# Others: Ceramic mugs

More information can be viewed at www.nea.gov.sg

Recycling fine but keep those litter bins
Straits Times Forum 16 Jun 09;

I REFER to yesterday's report, 'What rubbish', which highlighted the problem of unrecyclable rubbish being thrown into recycling bins in public areas.

Encouraging Singaporeans to recycle is the right direction to go. However, the recycling exercise need not be conducted at the expense of keeping Singapore clean.

Nowadays, town councils place recycling bins at various strategic locations in HDB estates. But many do so by removing several litter bins surrounding the area.

An example is Zone 4 of Toa Payoh Central, where a recycling bin is expected to 'cover' the vicinity of two children's playgrounds, a badminton court, a basketball court and a multi-purpose hall. Someone with litter to dispose of may have to walk 75m to the nearest recycling bin. Gone are the days of convenience when a litter bin was available every 15m.

Each morning, before the town council cleaners arrive, public areas are strewn with tonnes of rubbish thrown away the previous night. This is done not only by 'diehards', but also by those who simply cannot find a litter bin.

In time to come, public areas with a lack of rubbish disposal facilities will be a training ground for the next generation of litterbugs.

On an optimistic note, when we find chicken briyani, soggy tissues and prawn shells in recycling bins, we should perhaps see it as a good practice that some individuals at least bother to walk all the way to a bin to dispose of these items, given the circumstances.

Ho Kwok Hoong

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Taxis a green option? Think again

Straits Times Forum 15 Jun 09

I REFER to last Saturday's letter by the Singapore Environment Council (SEC), 'Taxis a green option, like car-sharing'. It quoted statistics showing the much smaller population of taxis compared to that of private cars.

The usage patterns of private cars and taxis are totally different.� Since car owners usually drive from point to point, private cars sit in carparks most of the time. However, the monetary incentive for taxi drivers is to drive passengers 24/7.

Taxis contribute to traffic volume (and environmental impact) at a level disproportionate to their population. �Even while queuing at taxi stands, cabbies usually leave their engines running. So I am surprised the SEC sees taxis as a green option.

It also misses the point on objections to the Land Transport Authority spending $1 million to boost taxi ridership.� Most of us agree that taxis are a necessary complement to public transport. The issue is whether public money should be used to promote taxi ridership.

Bryan Tan


Taxis a green option, like car-sharing
Straits Times Forum 13 Jun 09;

I REFER to Monday's letter by Mr Bryan Tan, 'Don't use public funds to up taxi ridership'. He states that 'promoting taxi ridership goes against the pro-environment campaign'.

While mass public transport is comparatively less pollutive, it would be simplistic to say that taxis are not pro-environment. It may also appear that taxis 'form a significant portion of traffic volume' when they converge on popular places to pick up passengers. However, statistics on the Land Transport Authority's website indicate otherwise. The number of taxis in 2007 was about 25,000. In comparison, the number of private cars was 450,000.

A good public transport system caters to the needs of every commuter. The taxi industry forms an important part of the system. Buses and trains do not run for 24 hours nor do they ply every road.

For many reasons and in different circumstances, it may not be possible for individuals to take the bus or train. Taxis fill the gaps for Singaporeans who would otherwise have decided it was necessary to buy a car and add to daily traffic congestion. Hiring taxis to get around can be viewed in the same way as public car-sharing or car-pooling. Taxis do provide a public service.

Therefore, arguments against funding increasing taxi usage should not write off the taxi as bad for the environment or a means of transport only for the better-off.

Esther Tan May Lynn (Ms)
Projects Manager
Singapore Environment Council

Don't use public funds to up taxi ridership
Straits Times Forum 8 Jun 09;

LAST Saturday's report, 'Fewer people taking taxis', mentioned that the Land Transport Authority (LTA) will provide $1 million to help promote taxi ridership. The money - slated to be matched by the taxi companies - will be used to hold promotions such as discounts and tie-ups with shopping centres and tourist attractions.

Taxpayers' money should not be used for such a purpose. Promoting taxi ridership goes against the pro-environment campaign to encourage more to switch to mass transport. Doing so also aggravates road congestion as taxis form a significant portion of traffic volume.

While I empathise with the predicament of taxi drivers during this time of economic downturn, almost all industries are affected by it. It is unfair to use public money to directly support any particular industry.

Instead, the law of supply and demand should be allowed to work itself out. The issue of lower income for cabbies is not surprising in an industry fraught with high supply - too many taxis - and low demand.�

The taxi companies must solve the problem at its source. Artificially propping up demand, especially with public funds, is neither prudent nor sustainable.

The LTA must justify this expenditure.�

Bryan Tan

Cars and taxis as different as apples and oranges
Straits Times Forum 16 Jun 09;

I REFER to last Saturday's letters by Ms Esther Tan of the Singapore Environment Council, 'Taxi is green option, like car-sharing', and Mr Poh Soon Leong, 'Boosting ridership a right move'.

Just because there are fewer taxis than private cars does not mean taxis are pro-environment. The average taxi clocks much more mileage than the average private car. At a rough guess of 400km a day for the average taxi and 60km a day for the average private car, one can see why taxis account for more congestion and emission than their number suggests. Moreover, taxis clock their mileage primarily downtown and in major town centres.

A fraction of taxi mileage is also expended cruising for passengers and when a taxi picks up a fare, chances are it is a single passenger. Unless passengers share taxis, taking a taxi is not the same as car-pooling.

Taxis are owned and operated like any other commercial undertaking. They survive by providing good service at competitive prices. The Land Transport Authority is charged with implementing transport policies, regulating transport rules and standards, and providing infrastructure such as bus stops and taxi stands, but it is not meant to promote taxi ridership. Yes, taxis pay road tax and Electronic Road Pricing charges but these are charged to passengers in the fare.

There is no fear of the taxi industry collapsing as no operator has given up its licence yet. In fact, more have entered the business.

Henry Tan

Taxis are a green alternative compared to private cars
Straits Times Forum 18 Jun 09;

ALLOW me to rebut Mr Bryan Tan's letter on Monday, 'Taxis a green option? Think again'.

According to the Land Transport Authority (LTA) website, as of last month, the motor vehicle population of private cars, buses, goods vehicles and motorcycles was about 900,000.

Assuming that each of these vehicles makes an average of two trips a day, to work and home, this makes a total of 1.8 million trips, though the buses and goods vehicles may travel more.

In comparison, taxis have a relatively small population of about 25,000. If each taxi makes an average of 50 trips a day, the total of 1.25 million is much smaller than that of other types of vehicles.

Today, most taxis have the Euro 4 engine, which helps to control the level of black smoke emitted. Many also run on compressed natural gas.

The LTA has a responsibility to ensure the survival of the public transport industry, whether buses, trains or taxis. The $1 million it provided to the taxi industry to promote ridership is only a fraction of the taxes paid by the industry in the form of road tax and diesel tax, apart from Electronic Road Pricing.

Therefore, the argument that public money is being used to promote taxi ridership is misguided.

Poh Soon Leong

LTA REPLIES: 3 aims of $1m fund
Straits Times Forum 20 Jun 09;

I REFER to the recent letters expressing concern over the use of public funds to promote taxi ridership, with some questioning if it was right for public funds to be used to subsidise taxi fares. We would like to clarify the objectives of the $1 million fund and put the issues in perspective.

The Land Transport Authority (LTA), in consultation with the taxi companies and the Taxi Operators Association (TOA), decided to set up a fund as a temporary measure to provide some help to the taxi industry and to serve the following three objectives:

# First, it aims to improve the service levels of taxi drivers, so as to enhance the overall delivery of service to commuters, by co-funding initiatives such as programmes on good service behaviours.

# Second, it encourages the industry to do more to stimulate demand, by co-funding initiatives from the taxi companies for up to one-third of the cost of the promotional activities, but this will expressly exclude any direct subsidy of taxi fares.

# Third, it serves to improve demand through improving convenience and accessibility for taxi commuters during major events like the Singapore Formula 1 Grand Prix and the Singapore River Hongbao, by supporting additional infrastructure facilities such as temporary taxi stands.

Such efforts will, on the whole, help the taxi industry better match the current taxi supply with demand, while continuing to improve service levels for the benefit of commuters.

Our objective is not just to help the industry cope with the downturn, but to also position the industry for the economic recovery and to better meet the additional demand expected when major projects like the integrated resorts open later this year.

Disbursements from the fund are by application only, and only proposals that meet the stipulated requirements will be approved. While a $1 million budget has been set aside, actual utilisation will depend on the merits of the proposals we receive.

Jeremy Yap
Group Director
Vehicle & Transit Licensing
Land Transport Authority

Promote use of MRT, not taxis, to protect environment
Straits Times Forum 20 Jun 09;

I REFER to the letter from the Singapore Environment Council (SEC) on Wednesday, "Taxis an alternative to car ownership".

Taxis provide a necessary and critical service for the handicapped, the aged, tourists and in times of emergency. They also cover the gap where access to public transport is difficult.

The debate about whether taxis are greener than private cars is irrelevant. Both are not green. Already there are disincentives against car ownership (ERP, COE, parking costs, and so on). The argument that car owners, having invested in the car, would like to maximise its use, is flawed.

There should not be a subsidy to promote taxi ridership. The industry should compete on its own merit. Any short-term decline due to the financial downturn can be addressed by adjusting taxi fare structures to attract more users. For starters, a simplified one-price structure irrespective of location or time will remove uncertainties and attract more riders. It will also deter abuse by cabbies.

To discourage car owners from driving, SEC should promote the park-and-ride scheme. Make parking at MRT stations more affordable. For example, parking gantries could be equipped with software to give rebates to drivers who ride on trains within a given time frame. The park-and-ride scheme failed to take off before because of the limited MRT network, cheaper gas prices and cheaper ERP levies.

The bottom line is that SEC should discourage taxi ridership and promote mass transit ridership if it really wants to serve its purpose of protecting the environment.

Jack Chew

Cabs are not a better green alternative to private cars
Straits Times Forum 5 Aug 09;

MR POH Soon Leong in his Forum Online letter recently, "Taxis are a green alternative compared to private cars", is wrong in his assumption that cabs are a more environment-friendly alternative. His sums do not add up.

It is simplistic to lump the emissions of Singapore's vehicle population of 895,000 vehicles with 1.8 million daily trips. There are marked contrasts in emissions among vehicles.

For instance, the emission of a bus is at least six times greater than that of a taxi. Therefore, the equivalent daily trips of 15,000 buses alone are more than 4.5 million, excluding 143,000 goods and other vehicles.

The right comparison should be based on emission facts between taxis and private cars. There are 550,000 private cars (22 times more than taxis). About half of that number are on the roads at the same time. Based on two trips a day, the total daily trips is only 550,000.

About 24,300 taxis roam the streets each day on business. Using 50 daily trips as the basic emission unit, the total daily trips for taxis work out to be 1.21 million - 2.2 times more than private cars.

Emissions of taxis are 48 times more than that of private cars, even though both are not green.

Finally, all taxis should be converted to gas-fired engines soon to reduce emissions and the public should be encouraged to take buses or trains.

Paul Chan

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Museum experts ID birds that bring down planes

Michael Tarm, Associated Press Yahoo News 13 Jun 09;

CHICAGO – When animals are the prime suspects in a whodunit, who gets on the case? In capers where feathers or fur are the smoking guns, the role of CSI is often played by top natural history museums.

They can even tell when the perp was from out of town.

The cockpit crew of US Airways Flight 1549 knew their plane had struck birds after taking off from New York's LaGuardia Airport. Both engines shut down and Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger had to ditch in the Hudson River — saving all 155 people aboard.

It was clear soon enough after the Jan. 15 accident that the guilty fowl were Canada geese. What wasn't known was whether they were migratory or homebody geese — a critical distinction as airports devise strategies to shoo them out of aircraft flight paths.

That's where the museums came in.

The Feather Identification Lab at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington served as lead detective, with assistance from Chicago's Field Museum.

"We try to tell people we're here for a reason — and this case helps demonstrate that," said ornithologist John Bates, who works with the Field Museum's 480,000-bird collection. It includes inch-long hummingbirds, 5-foot ostriches and everything in between.

Rows of cabinets on the 116-year-old museum's sprawling second floor hold specimens of 90 percent of the world's 10,000 known bird species. But it was the Field's collection of 2,700 samples of Canada geese — including some that migrated from the eastern Canada region of Labrador — that was the key to cracking the case.

Field ornithologists sent Labrador goose feathers and tissue to the Smithsonian, where tests showed the birds to blame for the US Airways accident were the Labrador type — not New York varieties that largely stay put year-round on the city's waterways.

The clincher was a test in which Smithsonian scientists tested stable hydrogen isotope values in feathers — telltale markers that indicate where vegetation eaten by the birds grew. Migrating Labrador geese have eaten grass from different areas than the stay-at-home New Yorkers, and that showed up in the tests.

The findings, published in the June 8 editions of the journal "Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment," mean New York airports may have to develop one method to keep migratory geese away from planes and another for the birds that nest in the city.

"A lot of people say 'who cares about knowing the bird type,'" said Carla Dove, the aptly named program director at the Feather Identification Laboratory. "But that's critical. The strategies differ according to species. If you have starlings or turkey vultures, you deal with it differently."

Authorities may manage resident birds by harassing and culling them or modifying their habitat. Dealing with transient birds may require more elaborate methods, including recording their flight patterns or employing sensitive radar that detects their movement over runways.

New York City officials said this past week the city will trap and gas as many as 2,000 Canada geese over the next few weeks.

The Field Museum scientists have been called into a variety of investigations over the years.

Authorities have sought their assistance in identifying animals smuggled into the U.S. and the feathers on headdresses brought in by tourists who may not have known they were fashioned from endangered birds, explained museum ornithologist, Dave Willard.

His detective work included once trying to decipher how many pieces of chicken were in a meal that may have been eaten by a suspect in one of the Chicago area's most notorious murders — the slaying of seven people inside a restaurant.

His comparison of the leftovers found in the garbage with chicken bones in Field's collection was inconclusive — though Willard still testified at the 2007 trial of suspect Juan Luna, who was later convicted.

Requests for Field detective services have tapered off over the past decade, in part because federal wildlife and other labs have taken up much of the slack.

The Smithsonian's four-employee feather lab is busier than ever, though, as the number of bird-plane collisions has soared. Pilots have reported hitting more than 59,700 birds since 2000, most often mourning doves, gulls, European starlings and American kestrels.

Every week, dozens of bird carcasses, parts or merely gooey remnants arrive by mail after they've been scrapped off damaged airplane engines. The US Airways strike involved birds that weighed an average of 8 pounds, and it took Dove and her team months to sift through 69 bags of remains.

Bird-strike cases processed by the unit jumped to more than 4,500 in 2008 from around 300 in 1989, Dove said. The lab has a success rate of more than 90 percent in identifying birds, solving many cases in just hours using a database of bird DNA.

But without the Field's goose collection, pinpointing the precise type of Canada geese could have taken longer, Dove said.

She said the US Airways case shows that bird collections, many compiled over more than a century, aren't just academic indulgences.

"Sometimes people on the street don't see how this work can be applied to their lives," she said. "Here, we can see these collections can be used for an immediate improvement in public safety. That's incredible."

___

Field Museum: http://www.fieldmuseum.org

Smithsonian: http://www.mnh.si.edu/

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Sick sea critters aided by Marine Mammal Center

Jason Dearen, Associated Press Yahoo News 14 Jun 09;

FORT CRONKHITE, Calif. – A recent surge in weakened and malnourished sea lions found along the Northern California coast is mystifying scientists and keeping workers hopping at the newly expanded Marine Mammal Center here.

"We're way ahead in the numbers this year. We have twice as many animals as we should," marine veterinarian Bill Van Bonn said after examining Charcoal, a sick harbor seal.

Experts at the non-profit center, located on wind-swept Marin headlands just north of the Golden Gate Bridge, believe the perplexing spike in malnourished sea lions along several hundred miles of coast could be due to a decline in populations of smaller fish that young seals and sea lions eat while developing.

"It's likely a problem with the food web, something lower in the food chain that is affected, but we are not sure what it is yet," said Van Bonn.

For 35 years, the seaside hospital has treated and studied ailing elephant seals and other coastal mammals in bath tubs and makeshift facilities. On Monday, as more and more sick animals are needing attention, a new $32 million building will be unveiled that expands the center's capacity and technical ability at a crucial time.

On a recent afternoon, center staff decked out in rubber boots and yellow slickers busily tended to about 130 critters lolling in the center's new pens, which are shaded by solar panels and feature pools with freshly filtered water.

The center treats an average of 600 marine mammals a year, but last year more than 800 were rescued. In a recent week, staff rescued 10 more sea lions a day than usual.

"It's concerning," said Jeff Boehm, the center's executive director.

The only bright side, Boehm said, is that the center is now better equipped to help solve the riddle.

They have "a state of the art lab, a state of the art suite for performing science and doing that pathological work which helps us understand diseases," Boehm said. The center also has surgeons to repair broken flippers or remove cataracts.

Elephant seals, harbor seals and California sea lions make up the bulk of the patients, but the center also is called upon to help untangle whales caught in fishing nets, or to perform necropsies on dead animals that wash ashore.

Only about 50 percent of the animals rescued make it out alive, but all of them help in the center's scientific mission: more than 14,000 genetic and tissue samples have been stored.

The new building allows for more public access, which is free. Visitors can view the animals in their pens, watch a necropsy or attend classes.

The Marine Mammal Center has also sought to have a lighter environmental footprint in its new digs: ceiling tiles are made of seaweed and structural beams are composed of partially recycled materials. The solar panels used to shade the pens also provides about 10 percent of the electricity consumed.

These days, as the ocean's acidity rises due to climate change, much of the center's work will be focused on studying how this changing sea chemistry is affecting the mammals that live within its 600 mile-reach. Only about eight percent of the center's patients are injured by hazards like fishing nets, tackle or boats.

On a recent sunny afternoon a group of the malnourished California sea lions barked as two volunteers held one of them down so a feeding tube could be inserted.

The staff force-fed the sea lion, known as Robin, with a yellowish mash of herring, water and salmon oil, hoping to bolster Robin's strength so she can eventually return to the sea.

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Cleaner air, thanks to heavy rains

New Straits Times 14 Jun 09;

KUALA LUMPUR: The haze eased up over parts of the country, thanks to heavy showers yesterday morning.

The Department of Environment's (DOE) Air Pollutant Index (API) in Klang, which had the highest reading, improved from 136 on Friday to 89 as of 5pm yesterday.

Other areas with high readings that had improved API were Cheras (from 109 to 76), Kajang (100 to 71) and Shah Alam (120 to 74).

Petaling Jaya improved from 93 to 74, Putrajaya (92 to 63), Batu Muda in Kuala Lumpur (99 to 75), Kuala Selangor (80 to 74), Port Dickson (74 to 56) and Miri (71 to 69).

API readings of 0-50 units are classified as good, 51-100 as moderate, 101-200 unhealthy, 201-300 very unhealthy and above 301 as hazardous.
The DOE listed 24 locations, or 48 per cent, as having good API, while 25 locations, or 51 per cent, were classified with moderate API readings.

Meteorological Department climatologist Dr Wan Azli Wan Hassan said a lot depended on rain and wind conditions for the haze situation to improve.

"It has to rain daily. Thunderstorms, preferably in the morning and evenings, will help clear up the skies of the pollutants."

However, Wan Azli cautioned that the haze could return should dry spells persists.

"This is because the source of the haze -- hotspots from forest fires in a neighbouring country -- has to be tackled. If the fires are not doused, the potential for haze is always there," he said.

Reports of indiscriminate burning of plantations in Sumatra have been blamed for the ashes and dust that are blown by south-westerly winds to the peninsula.

Read more!

Argentine glacier advances despite global warming

Jeannette Neumann, Associated Press Yahoo News 14 Jun 09;

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – Argentina's Perito Moreno glacier is one of only a few ice fields worldwide that have withstood rising global temperatures.

Nourished by Andean snowmelt, the glacier constantly grows even as it spawns icebergs the size of apartment buildings into a frigid lake, maintaining a nearly perfect equilibrium since measurements began more than a century ago.

"We're not sure why this happens," said Andres Rivera, a glacialist with the Center for Scientific Studies in Valdivia, Chile. "But not all glaciers respond equally to climate change."

Viewed at a safe distance on cruise boats or the wooden observation deck just beyond the glacier's leading edge, Perito Moreno's jagged surface radiates a brilliant white in the strong Patagonian sun. Submerged sections glow deep blue.

And when the wind blows in a cloud cover, the 3-mile-wide (5 kilometer) glacier seems to glow from within as the surrounding mountains and water turn a meditative gray.

Every few years, Perito Moreno expands enough to touch a point of land across Lake Argentina, cutting the nation's largest freshwater lake in half and forming an ice dam as it presses against the shore.

The water on one side of the dam surges against the glacier, up to 200 feet (60 meters) above lake level, until it breaks the ice wall with a thunderous crash, drowning the applause of hundreds of tourists.

"It's like a massive building falling all of the sudden," said park ranger Javier D'Angelo, who experienced the rupture in 2008 and 1998.

The rupture is a reminder that while Perito Moreno appears to be a vast, 19-mile-long (30 kilometer) frozen river, it's a dynamic icescape that moves and cracks unexpectedly.

"The glacier has a lot of life," said Luli Gavina, who leads mini-treks across the glacier's snow fields.

Mystery Glaciers Growing As Most Others Retreat
John Roach, National Geographic News 22 Jun 09;

Two South American glaciers are displaying strange behavior for the times: They're growing.

Most of the 50 massive glaciers draped over the spine of the Patagonian Andes are shrinking in response to a global warming, said Andrés Rivera, a glaciologist at the Center for Scientific Studies in Valdivia, Chile.

But the Perito Moreno glacier in Argentina and Pio XI glacier in Chile are taking on ice, instead of shedding it.

"What is happening … is not well understood," Rivera said.

Theories center on the geography and topography of the glaciers; the depth and temperature of the waters where the glaciers end; and how quickly, or slowly, they react to changes in the climate.

Yet overall, "if you account for the gains and losses of all of Patagonia's glaciers, they are [still] losing huge amounts of ice," Rivera pointed out.

Climate Insensitivity?

One hypothesis for the 3-mile-wide (5 kilometer-wide) Perito Moreno's advance is the glacier's apparent insensitivity to changes in what glaciologists call the equilibrium line on glaciers, Rivera said.

Roughly equivalent to the snow line, the equilibrium line is the elevation above which the glacier is growing, due to snow accumulation, and below which the glacier is melting.

When this line moves higher up a hill or a mountain due to rising temperatures, for example, more of the glacier is situated in the melting zone, and the glacier retreats.

But because Argentina's Perito Moreno glacier is so steep in the area where the equilibrium line falls, climate shifts don't impact the line's movement much, at least as it relates to the height of the mountain, Rivera noted.

As a result, the amount of of ice lost or gained is minimal.

"No Convincing Result"

It could also be that Perito Moreno simply hasn't got all that much to lose.

The lake where Perito Moreno ends—Lago Argentino—is shallower than the bodies of water at the ends of most glaciers.

Most glaciers calve, or release ice, in deep water, but not Perito Moreno, where the calving rates are higher than on other Patagonian glaciers.

That means less of the glacier is in the melting zone below the equilibrium line.

As heavy snowfall above the equilibrium line pushes the glacier downhill, the glacier breaks up when it hits the lake, Rivera explained.

Such impacts kept the glacier from growing longer when the climate was cooler, and thus more likely to expand, he said.

If Perito Moreno had extended into a deep lake area, it would have become a longer glacier, and Earth's recent warming trend would be causing the glacier to melt and its ice to retreat more easily, Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University in University Park, said in an email.

"Instead, we have a shorter glacier, with less [of a] zone where the warming can cause melting, but a large high-elevation [snow and ice] accumulation zone," Alley added.

As for the Pio XI glacier in Chile, some scientists have attempted to explain its advance as a glacial surge, a periodic and sudden expansion of a glacier that is little understood but is thought to be unrelated to external forces.

But the Chilean glaciologist, Rivera, said the evidence is inconclusive.

"At the end of the day, there is not a clear, convincing result for this research," he said.

"So, I am not sure why these glaciers are advancing."

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