Green Options

Hollywood, as a whole, is one of the most powerful entities (can I call it that?) in the world. Some of its biggest stars are getting involved in the politics of climate and clean energy now.

A great new video on the web featuring Leonardo DiCaprio, Felicity Huffman, Forest Whitaker, Ed Norton, Justin Long, and others nails the key points of climate and energy legislation with the most popular language.

One of the stars even decides to drop his pants because of the heat (climate change).

There’s a bit of news coverage right now about the cold weather that’s hitting certain parts of the world, but don’t jump into the idea that we’ve entered global cooling. Take a look at the rest of the world and a little historical perspective, as well as the reason why some of us are getting this cold weather in the first place.

Starting on Christmas, yesterday, two sea turtles that are being tracked by scientists as they swim around the world’s oceans can also be tracked online by common, interested folks.

The turtles, named Noelle and Darwinia, are both females and are leatherback turtles that nest in Gabon in Western Central Africa. As the University of Exeter states, “The research team has fitted each turtle with a small satellite tracking device, which enables the scientists to monitor their precise movements and observe where and how deep they dive.”

So far, the turtles have swum a combined 800 miles (since the tracking started on December 7th).

An international team of scientists has determined that the Atlantic Ocean rose faster in the 20th century than at any time in the last 4,000 years, but not uniformly along the coast.

One of the researchers, assistant professor Benjamin Horton in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science at the University of Pennsylvania, says: “There is universal agreement that sea level will rise as a result of global warming but by how much, when and where it will have the most effect is unclear.” He and other researchers have now started to tackle this issue.

Interestingly, the rate of sea level rise in recent years varies according to how far north or south you are on the coast.

The largest working hydro-electric wave energy device was launched by Queen’s University Belfast, Aquamarine Power Ltd. and the Scottish government recently, bringing the global wave energy industry one major move forward.

The device is called Oyster. It is the only hydro-electric wave energy device producing power in the world, according to Queens University Belfast.

How does it work?

Fishing and refuse disposal are to be banned in the 1st high seas Marine Protected Area (MPA) in the Southern Ocean, an area of the ocean that contains more species than the Galapagos Islands.

This will allow scientists to monitor the effects of climate change in this region. This is only the first of possibly twelve such areas.

The oceans seem like a great potential source for clean energy. The force of the waves, the constancy, the size of the oceans — it all seems like something that could produce energy for humans without much harm. (I still have some concerns, though it seems like one of the best options these days). Some of the major problems with utilizing the force of the oceans, however, have been how to survive storms, the need to be anchored to the see floor, and efficiency.

Researchers from the US Air Force Academy have a new, outside-the-box idea for dealing with these problems — use an aerospace approach.

This is yet to be developed to full-scale and tested in that form, but early computer and model-scale tests are showing higher efficiencies than wind turbines, according to the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Oceans regulate our climate. They play a key role in keeping the world’s “homeostasis” in tact. However, their ability to absorb carbon & keep the climate in balance is dwindling, a new report shows.

In a year-by-year study from 1765 to 2008, researchers found that the oceans are struggling to meet increasing emissions demands. They cannot take in as much carbon as they used to.

The study, published in the November 19 issue of the journal Nature, found that the percentage of fossil fuel emissions the ocean has been taking in since 2000 has decreased by as much as 10%.

This is the first study of its kind or breadth. One previous study had attempted to measure the oceans’ industrial carbon absorption for one year — 1994. This does so for a period of 200+ years.

An ecologist and an engineer at Michigan State University are working together to create robot fish that can better monitor various factors in aquatic environments.

Combining the brilliance of nature with some top-notch engineering, these two scientists are on to something and getting the funding for it.

The researchers are breaking ground with this and looking to raise water monitoring to another level.

This week in the journal Nature scientists give the most comprehensive view of thinning ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica to date.

Scientists from British Antarctic Survey (BAS) and the University of Bristol analyzed 50 million satellite measurements (from NASA) to show the massive ice loss on these polar giants.

The result are surprising, even to the scientists.

A new study by nearly 30 of the world’s best scientists concludes that we have crossed three of the world’s nine thresholds. It is not only about climate change.