Just a nudge could collapse West Antarctic Ice Sheet, raise sea levels 3 meters

NASA/MARIA-JOSÉ VIÑAS

Two Antarctic ice shelves on the verge of collapsing—the Pine Island Glacier (shown) and the Thwaites Glacier—will cause the ultimate collapse of the entire West Antarctic Ice Sheet, a new study shows.

It won’t take much to cause the entire West Antarctic Ice Sheet to collapse—and once it starts, it won’t stop. In the last year, a slew of papers has highlighted the vulnerability of the ice sheet covering the western half of the continent, suggesting that its downfall is inevitable—and probably already underway. Now, a new model shows just how this juggernaut could unfold. A relatively small amount of melting over a few decades, the authors say, will inexorably lead to the destabilization of the entire ice sheet and the rise of global sea levels by as much as 3 meters.

Previous models have examined the onset of the collapse in detail. In 2014, two papers, one in Science and one in Geophysical Review Letters, noted that the Thwaites Glacier, which some scientists call the “weak underbelly” of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, has retreated dramatically over the past 2 decades. Most Antarctic researchers chalk this up to warm seawater melting the floating ice shelves at their bases; seawater temperatures there have risen since the 1970s, in part because of global temperature increases. Right now, an underwater ledge is helping anchor the glacier in place. But when the glacier retreats past that bulwark, it will collapse into the ocean; then seawater will intrude and melt channels into the ice sheet, setting the juggernaut in motion.

Scientists agree that this is going to happen, says Eric Rignot of the University of California, Irvine, lead author of the Geophysical Review Letters paper. “The real central question is the time scale.”

But most models have focused on short-term timescales, decades or a few centuries at most, says Anders Levermann, a climate scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany and co-author of the new paper. He and climate scientist Johannes Feldmann, also of the Potsdam climate center, wanted to examine how the destabilization would progress in the longer term, over hundreds to thousands of years. “The big question was how far [the instability] would reach inland,” Levermann says.

To study this, they ran computer simulations focusing on the dynamic forces that would act on the ice over time, from frozen inland ice to fast-flowing ice streams to floating ice shelves. They used the model first to simulate existing, observed subsurface melting within the Amundsen Sea, a region of West Antarctica that includes two vulnerable glaciers, Thwaites and the Pine Island Glacier. The model simulated current observations of enhanced, rapid melting until it recreated the current positions of the glaciers. Then they turned down the heat: They returned the model’s ocean and atmosphere conditions to those existing in the later 20th century, rather than the current 21st century conditions that have been causing rapid melting. “We wanted to show [how] it unfolds without us pushing it anymore,” Levermann says.

What they found was that local destabilization of the Amundsen Sea region of West Antarctica ultimately causes the entire ice sheet to fall into the ocean over several centuries to several thousands of years, gradually adding 3 meters to global sea levels, they report online today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The model shows that “there’s no holding back,” Levermann says: Just a few decades of melting leads to “thousands of years of ice motion.” More than 150 million people globally live within just 1 meter of the sea; in the United States, a sea level rise of 3 meters would inundate many of the East Coast’s largest cities, including New York and Miami.

One of the most startling results, he adds, was the knock-on effects of the melting. In an earlier study, the team found that the neighboring Filchner-Ronne and Ross ice shelves would not collapse on their own; the seafloor topography would keep them anchored in place and prevent the destabilizing inward rush of seawater. But when the Amundsen Sea region is destabilized, the model showed, the entering seawater was able to erode those ice shelves from the inside out.

“This paper does confirm what we hypothesized, that knocking out the Pine Island Glacier and Thwaites takes down the rest of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet,” says Ian Joughin, a glaciologist at the University of Washington, Seattle, who co-authored last year’s Sciencepaper. He adds, however, that the model’s weakness is its resolution; it shows the destabilization of the glaciers occurring roughly 60 years from now, whereas present observations suggest that collapse is already underway. As a result, Joughin says, the model’s time scale for the collapse is probably too long. “It’s more likely measured in centuries rather than millennia.”

Indeed, “the jury is still out” on whether Feldmann and Levermann’s study got the time scale right, Rignot says. The long-term evolution of an ice sheet “is a very complex modeling problem. Some of the variables controlling the models are not all that well known,” he adds, including forces such as winds, ocean circulation, and how icebergs calve. “There is not a model out there that is getting it right, because they all have caveats. I think the discussion is ongoing, and is only going to be more interesting with time.”

Posted in Climate, Environment

Underlying causes of Delhi’s air pollution problems

A new study "Air Pollution Challenges for developing megacities like Delhi" published today inAtmospheric Environment has described how Delhi suffers a toxic blend of geography, growth, poor energy sources and unfavourable weather that perpetuates and propagates its dangerously high levels of air pollution.

A team of researchers led by the University of Surrey assessed how Delhi's landscape, weather, energy consumption culture, and growing urban population combines to elevate concentrations of air pollutants, including ultrafine particles, the most harmful to human health.

"Air pollution has been placed in the top ten health risks faced by human beings globally. Delhi has the dubious accolade of being regularly cited as the most polluted city in the world, with air pollution causing thousands of excess deaths in a year in this growing megacity, explained Dr Prashant Kumar of the University of Surrey.

" Whilst it might be easy to blame this on increased use of vehicles, industrial production or a growing population, the truth is that Delhi is a toxic pollutant punchbowl with myriad ingredients, all which need addressing in the round."

Delhi is one of the largest population centres in the world. Classed as the world's fifth 'megacity', it has a population of 25.8 million, which continues to grow. With this growth, our research predicted that the number of road vehicles will increase from 4.7 million in 2010 to nearly 26 million by 2030. Total energy consumption in Delhi has risen 57% from 2001 to 2011.

As a landlocked megacity Delhi has limited avenues for flushing polluted air out of the city. Coastal megacities such as Mumbai have at least a chance to 'replace' polluted air with relatively unpolluted sea breezes, whereas Delhi's surrounding regions are sometimes even more polluted than the city. For example, most of the brick kilns used for making bricks are not located in the city, but in predominantly upwind surrounding industrial areas.

These outside pollutants can be attributed to use of low-quality fuels such as raw wood, agricultural and plastic waste in industrial settings, cow dung for cooking stoves and widespread use of diesel generators due to unreliable infrastructure. These sources release fine particle pollutants, the most dangerous to human health.

In Delhi fine particle pollution rates are ten times higher than that of Chennai, which has ten times more cars but is coastally located, without the surrounding industrial areas.

Coupled with Delhi's densely packed architecture, and varying building heights the 'breathability' of the city is inhibited by its weather conditions. The city's decreasing temperature (attributed to the effects of pollution) draws outside polluted air into the city centre, whilst windy, dusty conditions during summer exacerbate this problem.

"The picture of Delhi's pollution problem is complicated and is aggravated by some factors that are out of human control," continued Dr Kumar. "However, in this growing city it is important that the population is protected in whatever ways they can be from health-endangering pollutants. Simple remedies such as 'greening' unpaved roadside areas through a natural or artificial grass canopy could possibly help in limiting coarse dust particles during dry and windy seasons. Natural measures, such as the development of wetlands and trees are also effective."

"There is also a cultural context here. Even the best science and technology will not succeed in reducing emissions and improving air quality if it is not considered in a broader framework of economic development of the country, rising awareness of public health risks and a change in attitudes and regulation towards poor quality fuels. It is a complicated, pick-and-mix of problems that will prove difficult to combat without innovative, encompassing and quick action."

Storage advance may boost solar thermal energy potential

An advance in the storage of concentrated solar thermal energy may reduce reduce its cost and make it more practical for wider use.

Credit: Graphic by Kelvin Randhir, courtesy of the University of Florida

Engineers at Oregon State University have identified a new approach for the storage of concentrated solar thermal energy, to reduce its cost and make it more practical for wider use.

The advance is based on a new innovation with thermochemical storage, in which chemical transformation is used in repeated cycles to hold heat, use it to drive turbines, and then be re-heated to continue the cycle. Most commonly this might be done over a 24-hour period, with variable levels of solar-powered electricity available at any time of day, as dictated by demand.

The findings have been published in ChemSusChem, a professional journal covering sustainable chemistry. The work was supported by the SunShot Initiative of the U.S. Department of Energy, and done in collaboration with researchers at the University of Florida.

Conceptually, all of the energy produced could be stored indefinitely and used later when the electricity is most needed. Alternatively, some energy could be used immediately and the rest stored for later use.

Storage of this type helps to solve one of the key factors limiting the wider use of solar energy -- by eliminating the need to use the electricity immediately. The underlying power source is based on production that varies enormously, not just night and day, but some days, or times of day, that solar intensity is more or less powerful. Many alternative energy systems are constrained by this lack of dependability and consistent energy flow.

Solar thermal electricity has been of considerable interest because of its potential to lower costs. In contrast to conventional solar photovoltaic cells that produce electricity directly from sunlight, solar thermal generation of energy is developed as a large power plant in which acres of mirrors precisely reflect sunlight onto a solar receiver. That energy has been used to heat a fluid that in turn drives a turbine to produce electricity.

Such technology is appealing because it's safe, long-lasting, friendly to the environment and produces no greenhouse gas emissions. Cost, dependability and efficiency have been the primary constraints.

"With the compounds we're studying, there's significant potential to lower costs and increase efficiency," said Nick AuYeung, an assistant professor of chemical engineering in the OSU College of Engineering, corresponding author on this study, and an expert in novel applications and use of sustainable energy.

"In these types of systems, energy efficiency is closely related to use of the highest temperatures possible," AuYeung said. "The molten salts now being used to store solar thermal energy can only work at about 600 degrees centigrade, and also require large containers and corrosive materials. The compound we're studying can be used at up to 1,200 degrees, and might be twice as efficient as existing systems.

"This has the potential for a real breakthrough in energy storage," he said.

According to AuYeung, thermochemical storage resembles a battery, in which chemical bonds are used to store and release energy -- but in this case, the transfer is based on heat, not electricity.

The system hinges on the reversible decomposition of strontium carbonate into strontium oxide and carbon dioxide, which consumes thermal energy. During discharge, the recombination of strontium oxide and carbon dioxide releases the stored heat. These materials are nonflammable, readily available and environmentally safe.

In comparison to existing approaches, the new system could also allow a 10-fold increase in energy density -- it's physically much smaller and would be cheaper to build.

The proposed system would work at such high temperatures that it could first be used to directly heat air which would drive a turbine to produce electricity, and then residual heat could be used to make steam to drive yet another turbine.

In laboratory tests, one concern arose when the energy storage capacity of the process declined after 45 heating and cooling cycles, due to some changes in the underlying materials. Further research will be needed to identify ways to reprocess the materials or significantly extend the number of cycles that could be performed before any reprocessing was needed, AuYeung said.

Other refinements may also be necessary to test the system at larger scales and resolve issues such as thermal shocks, he said, before a prototype could be ready for testing at a national laboratory.

Study of cloud cover in tropical Pacific reveals future climate changes

A new analysis using changes in cloud cover over the tropical Indo-Pacific Ocean showed that a weakening of a major atmospheric circulation system over the last century is due, in part, to increased greenhouse gas emissions. The findings from researchers at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science provide new evidence that climate change in the tropical Pacific will result in changes in rainfall patterns in the region and amplify warming near the equator in the future.

"Our findings show that an increasing concentration of greenhouse gases leads to significant changes in atmospheric circulation and tropical rainfall patterns," said Katinka Bellomo, an alumna of the UM Rosenstiel School. "This study demonstrates that we can predict these changes in the Walker circulation from changes in cloud cover."

The UM Rosenstiel School researchers used historical observations of cloud cover as a proxy for wind velocity in climate models to analyze the Walker circulation, the atmospheric air flow and heat distribution in the tropic Pacific region that affects patterns of tropical rainfall. Their findings revealed a weakening and eastward shift of the Walker circulation over the last century due to greenhouse gas emissions. The analysis showed that changes in cloud cover can serve as a proxy in climate models for wind velocity in the atmosphere, which cannot be directly measured.

"This study makes innovative use of a decades old-dataset," said Amy Clement, professor of atmospheric science at the UM Rosenstiel School. "It is impressive that visual observations from the decks of ships transiting the Pacific Ocean over a half-century can tell us something so fundamental about climate change."

This new information can be incorporated into current climate models to predict future changes in the magnitude and pattern of the Walker Circulation due to increased greenhouse gas emissions. The study suggests that rainfall will decrease over Indonesia and in the western Pacific and increase over the central Pacific Ocean.

Read more on

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/11/151104180534.htm

Climate change is moving mountains

Research points to strong interaction between climate shifts, increased internal movement in the North American St. Elias Mountain Range

Terminus of the Hubbard Glacier at Resurrection Bay. The ice front is about 300 feet high.

Credit: provided by UC's Eva Enkelmann

For millions of years global climate change has altered the structure and internal movement of mountain ranges, but the resulting glacial development and erosion can in turn change a mountain's local climate. The degree of this cause-and-effect relationship has never been clearly observed, until now.

Based on research led by University of Cincinnati geologist Eva Enkelmann in the St. Elias Mountain Range -- located along the Pacific coastal region of North America -- the way a mountain range moves and behaves topographically can also change and create its local climate by redirecting wind and precipitation. The repercussions of these changes can in turn, accelerate the erosion and tectonic seismic activity of that mountain range.

Based on her findings, Enkelmann shows clear evidence for a strong relationship between global and local climate change and a mountain's internal tectonic plate shifts and topographic changes.

Enkelmann, an assistant professor in the University of Cincinnati Department of Geology, was among several UC researchers and thousands of geoscientists from around the globe presenting their findings at the 2015 Annual Geological Society of America Meeting, Nov.1-4, in Baltimore.

This research also was published in July in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Moving Mountains

"To understanding how mountain structures evolve through geologic time is no quick task because we are talking millions of years," says Enkelmann. "There are two primary processes that result in the building and eroding of mountains and those processes are interacting."

Looking at the St. Elias Mountains in particular, Enkelmann notes how dry it is in the northern part of the mountain range. But the precipitation is very high in the southern area, resulting in more erosion and material coming off the southern flanks. So as the climate change influences the erosion, that can produce a shift in the tectonics. This has been suggested in earlier studies based on numerical and analytical models, however, it had not yet been shown to have occurred over geologic times in the real world.

Enkelmann synthesized several different data sets to show how a rapid exhumation occurred in the central part of the mountain range over four to two million years ago. This feedback process between erosion and internal tectonic shifting resulted in a mass of material moving up toward the surface very rapidly.

Enkelmann's model suggests that global climate shifts triggered a change in the rheology -- the way material behaves.

While Earth was much warmer millions of years ago, glaciers still existed in the high altitudes. However, 2.6 million years ago Earth experienced a shift to a colder climate and glaciation intensified. Existing glaciers grew larger, froze solid, covered the area and did not move.

Enkelmann says the glaciers today are wet-based and are moving, very aggressively eroding material around and out, and in the case of her observation, into the Gulf of Alaska. The tectonic forces (internal plates moving toward one another) continue to move toward Alaska, get pushed underneath and the sediment on top is piling up above the Yakutat plate.

Shake, Rattle and Roll

Adding to the already complex effects of climate change, these processes essentially work against each other.

The movement of glaciers can compete with the internal buildup and develop a feedback process that is very rapid and ferocious. Scientists have suggested that the Himalayas, European Alps and mountains in Taiwan were caused by the same competing reactions as those Enkelmann has observed in southeastern Alaska.

In Enkelmann's observation, the climate-driven erosion can influence the tectonics and change the motion of the rocks in that area. This makes studying the St. Elias Mountain Range particularly ideal because this area is very active tectonically, with strong glacial erosion. As an example, she cites the Great Alaskan Earthquake of 1964 -- the world's second largest earthquake recorded to date -- that also resulted in a tsunami.

"In 1899, there were two big earthquakes in a row, an 8.1 and an 8.2 magnitude, says Enkelmann pointing to a photo of the resulting shoreline lift that still stands today. "These earthquakes resulted in up to 14 meters of co-seismic uplift on the shore, so the shoreline basically popped up 14 meters (45 feet) and it happened immediately.

"Our biggest concern today is the continued potential for earthquakes that can also result in tsunamis," says Enkelmann.

Enkelmann appreciates the challenge of collecting samples here because this range has the highest peaks of any coastal mountain range and is only 20 kilometers from the Pacific Ocean, but she points out that it is a tough area to study because of the big ice sheets.

"So as geologists, we go to the area and take samples and do measurements in the field on the mountain ranges that stick out," says Enkelmann. "One approach is to sample the material that comes out of the glaciers that has transported the eroded sediment and analyze that sediment.

"By going to all of these individual glaciers, we can get a much better understanding of what has happened and what was moved on the entire mountain range."

Climate change: A wake-up call in the world of finance

As climate changes become impossible to dismiss, how does the mainstream investor community respond? Are financial decisions taking full account of risks and opportunities related to climate change, or is the topic still virtually ignored in financial decision-making?

The environmental effects of climate change in our modern world are increasingly convincing, and global leaders will gather soon in a major Summit to try to address the problem. As climate changes become impossible to dismiss, how does the mainstream investor community respond? Are financial decisions taking full account of risks and opportunities related to climate change, or is the topic still virtually ignored in financial decision-making? Paula DiPerna sets out new trends and momentum to answer these questions in her article, published in the current issue ofEnvironment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development, "Wall Street Wakes Up: Sustainable Investment and Finance Going Mainstream."

The forthcoming Climate Summit in Paris in December comes after many years of global negotiations. During the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, Heads of States committed their nations to improving environmental conditions and battling climate change. The result? DiPerna writes, "Some progress has been made, of course, but far too little, considering the thousands of person-hours spent in strategy sessions, conferences, and scenario building worldwide." Breakthroughs in environmental initiatives have been made, but an overall well-funded "reindustrialization and reemployment initiative" still remains unseen today. DiPerna suggests that a reason for the lag is for the failure to link environmental and economic questions in comprehensive fashion.

However, DiPerna cites new momentum among mainstream investors to take climate change issues into account, with new and strong interest by investors in reckoning with the fact that both the risks and costs of extreme weather events will continue to rise, with significant implications for economic stability. As more environmental information is accumulated, and the more climate change becomes irrefutable, the more relevant environmental reality becomes to economic well-being. And, DiPerna writes, mainstream investors have begun react to this connection. As more financial data is collected, the more sensible sustainable investments appear. Quite simply, DiPerna writes, "With more meaningful environmental thinking on Wall Street, climate change can be addressed and without that new thinking, climate change cannot be addressed."

Ultimately, green investments can change the landscape of our country, both socially and economically, and new thinking on Wall Street can help pave the way for these much-needed changes to occur. According to DiPerna, as a new generation of investors come into power, one can hope that a corner has been turned on Wall Street.

Study offers model to predict how microbiomes may respond to change

Scientists studying microbiomes have created a framework for predicting how the composition of these complex microbial communities may respond to changing conditions.

The review study, led by Jennifer Martiny, professor of ecology & evolutionary biology at the University of California, Irvine, appears in the Nov. 5 issue of Science. It presents a far-reaching assessment of microbiomes that could affect efforts to improve human health and the health of all Earth's ecosystems.

Microbiomes are collections of microscopic organisms -- such as bacteria, viruses, archaea, fungi, protozoa, algae and plankton -- that inhabit ecosystems as varied as the human digestive tract, the ocean and soil. For instance, the 100 trillion microbes in the human gut -- which vastly outnumber the "human" cells in our bodies -- are critical to our health and development.

A few grams of soil or sediment may contain tens or even hundreds of thousands of microbial species, each interacting with the others. Together, they are largely responsible for the processing of nutrients and carbon in soil -- regulating the decomposition of waste materials, the regeneration of soil fertility and greenhouse gas emissions.

The study delves into microbial evolutionary processes and explores previous research showing that microbial traits -- particularly with bacteria -- vary predictably in how they have evolved across the "tree of life." For example, some traits, such as photosynthesis, evolved a long time ago and are shared by large groups of genetically related bacteria. Other traits, such as sensitivity to a particular virus, have evolved many times in many small groups.

Martiny said that analysis of these earlier studies, along with her own work on soil microbial communities, suggested a way to forecast how changes in climate or diet, for instance, might affect ecosystems or the digestive tract. Patterns of microbiome diversity among samples can reveal more information than previously thought when paired with the evolutionary history of microbial traits. Microbiologists could use this information to narrow down the reasons for differences in microbiome diversity among many samples.

Recently, microbiome studies have sparked much public interest. Last week, leading scientists in the field called for the creation of a major federal initiative to better understand microbial communities involved with ecosystem and human health.

The planet hosts a vast variety of microbial communities, from those in undersea volcanos and plant ecosystems to untold numbers of microbes in the human body that fight disease. These microbiomes share many similar traits, and further research on them could reveal basic information about Earth and its inhabitants.

Martiny added that her study offers just one pathway toward a more integrated grasp of microbiomes across all environments. "In addition to new technologies, we're in desperate need of new conceptual models to help us understand these complex communities," she said. "We already have a lot of data about microbiomes that could be put to further use."

Report: Environmental Degradation Threatens Global Progress for Poor

This year's Human Development Report warns environmental degradation threatens global progress for the poor. It says inaction on climate change and habitat destruction is jeopardizing health and the pursuit of higher income in developing countries.

The 2011 Human Development Report warns development progress in the world's poorest countries could be halted or even reversed by mid-century because of environmental degradation.

It says this can be stopped if bold steps are taken now to slow climate change, prevent further environmental damage, and reduce deep inequalities within and among nations.

The report notes both developing and developed countries have made significant progress in human development since 1980. But it argues many of these gains will be lost if environmental deterioration goes unchecked.

Lead author of the report Jeni Klugman says nations in sub-Saharan Africa are at particular risk.

"The main problems that we see in sub-Saharan Africa are around land degradation and desertification, which are affecting livelihoods of many millions of people, obviously in rural areas," said Klugman.  "We also see some significant problems around access to water and safe sanitation in both rural and urban areas."

The report says half of all malnutrition in sub-Saharan Africa is caused by environmental factors. It says environmental degradation is expected to cut agricultural productivity and cause food prices to soar by up to 50 percent in the coming decades.

It says environmental deterioration could undermine decades of efforts to expand water, sanitation and access to electricity to the world's poorest communities. While drought in sub-Saharan Africa is of concern, the authors say sea level rises in low-lying nations in South Asia and the Pacific will put more than 100 million people at risk in the decades ahead.

A key feature of the report is its Human Development Index, which ranks countries on their achievements in health, education and income. This year, Norway, Australia and the Netherlands top the rankings of 187 countries, while the Democratic Republic of Congo, Niger and Burundi are at the bottom.

Klugman draws a comparison between the best- and worst-achieving countries.

"For example, life expectance in Democratic Republic of Congo is 48 years if someone is born today, whereas if they were born in Norway, it would be 81 years," noted Klugman.  "So, it is a huge difference. And, if you go to each of the components of the index, so for example, the average number of years that you would expect a child to go to school in Norway is nearly 13. If they are in the DRC, it is only three-and-one-half years. So, it is just stark differences."

The United States, New Zealand, Canada, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Germany and Sweden round out the top 10 countries in the 2011 Human Development Index. The 10 countries that place last in the rankings are all in sub-Saharan Africa.

Petroleum, Pollution and Poverty in the Niger Delta

The Niger Delta is one of the 10 most important wetland and coastal marine ecosystems in the world and is home to some 31 million people.¹ The Niger Delta is also the location of massive oil deposits, which have been extracted for decades by the government of Nigeria and by multinational oil companies. Oil has generated an estimated $600 billion since the 1960s.²

Despite this, the majority of the Niger Delta's population lives in poverty. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) describes the region as suffering from "administrative neglect, crumbling social infrastructure and services, high unemployment, social deprivation, abject poverty, filth and squalor, and endemic conflict."³ The majority of the people of the Niger Delta do not have adequate access to clean water or health-care.⁴ Their poverty, in contrast with the wealth generated by oil, has become one of the world's starkest and most disturbing examples of the "resource curse".

For the people of the Niger Delta, environmental quality and sustainability are fundamental to their overall wellbeing and development. According to UNDP, more than 60 per cent of the people in the region depend on the natural environment for their livelihood.⁵ For many, the environmental resource base, which they use for agriculture, fishing and the collection of forest products, is their principal or sole source of food. Pollution and environmental damage, therefore, pose significant risks to human rights.

 

Click image to enlarge

Oil spills, waste dumping and gas flaring are endemic in the Niger Delta. This pollution, which has affected the area for decades, has damaged the soil, water and air quality. Hundreds of thousands of people are affected, particularly the poorest and those who rely on traditional livelihoods such as fishing and agriculture. The human rights implications are serious, under-reported and have received little attention from the government of Nigeria or the oil companies.

According to a study carried out by a team of Nigerian and international environmental experts in 2006,⁶the Niger Delta is "one of the world's most severely petroleum-impacted ecosystems". They stated: "The damage from oil operations is chronic and cumulative, and has acted synergistically with other sources of environmental stress to result in a severely impaired coastal ecosystem and compromised the livelihoods and health of the region's impoverished residents."

Oil Spills

The Niger Delta has suffered for decades from oil spills, which occur both on land and offshore. Oil spills on land destroy crops and damage the quality and productivity of soil that communities use for farming. Oil in water damages fisheries and contaminates water that people use for drinking and other domestic purposes.⁷

There are a number of reasons why oil spills happen so frequently in the Niger Delta. Spills result from corrosion of oil pipes, poor maintenance of infrastructure, spills or leaks during processing at refineries,⁸ human error and as a consequence of deliberate vandalism or theft of oil.⁹

In August and December 2008, two major oil spills disrupted the lives of the 69,000 or so people living in Bodo, a town in Ogoniland in the Niger Delta. Both spills continued for weeks before they were stopped. Estimates s uggest that the volume of oil spilled was as large as the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska in 1989.¹⁰ Three years on, the prolonged failure of the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, to clean up the oil that was spilled, continues to have catastrophic consequences for the Bodo community. The lives of tens of thousands of people have been directly affected by the spills and the ongoing pollution. Many are worried about their health and are afraid to eat locally caught fish or drink water from streams or rain water, as they did before the oil spills.

Read More: Amnesty International, "The True 'Tragedy': Delays and Failures in Tackling oil Spills in the Niger Delta"

Gas Flaring

When oil is pumped out of the ground, the gas produced is separated and, in Nigeria, most of it is burnt as waste in massive flares. This practice has been going on for almost five decades. The burning of this "associated gas" has long been acknowledged as extremely wasteful and environmentally damaging.¹¹ Flares, which continue for 24 hours a day in many areas, cause serious discomfort to people living near the flare sites. Flaring creates noise pollution and communities may have to live with permanent light. When gas is flared, the combustion is often incomplete, so oil droplets fall on waterways, crops, houses and people.

 

Click image to enlarge

In recent years, communities, NGOs and some health professionals have raised concerns about the impact of gas flaring on human health. The health risks may be particularly high for people with underlying health problems, for young children and the elderly and for pregnant women. Despite these repeated expressions of concern, neither the government nor the oil companies have carried out any specific study to look at the impacts of flaring on human health. This serious failure leaves [thousands] of people facing unknown short- and long-term risks.

Nigeria has prohibited gas flaring since 1984, unless a ministerial consent has been issued.¹² Although the government has announced various deadlines for the cessation of flaring, each deadline has passed and flaring continues. Given the potential for serious negative impacts on human health, as well as on livelihoods, the Nigerian government should conduct investigations into the effects on health and agricultural production. Such investigations are necessary in order for the government to properly discharge its international legal obligation to protect the human rights of the people of Nigeria.

The exposure of people to potentially serious risks to health requires that decisive and swift action is taken to investigate and monitor their health status, to protect vulnerable groups and to end the practice of flaring. Monitoring of health impacts should continue even after flaring has ended to ensure that any long-term health impacts are identified and addressed.

Human Rights Impact

In 2001 the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (African Commission) stated, "pollution and environmental degradation to a level humanly unacceptable has made living in Ogoni land a nightmare."¹³ Similar pollution and environmental degradation is experienced across much of the oil producing areas of the Niger Delta.

It is important that the impact of the oil industry on the environment in the Niger Delta is understood as occurring in a context where the livelihoods, health and access to food and clean water of hundreds of thousands of people are closely linked to the land and environmental quality. The environmental damage that has been done, and continues to be done, as a consequence of oil production in the Niger Delta, has led to serious violations of human rights.

People living in the Niger Delta have to drink, cook with, and wash in polluted water; they eat fish contaminated with oil and other toxins - if they are lucky enough to still be able to find fish; the land they use for farming is being destroyed because of the lack of respect for the ecosystem necessary for their survival; after oil spills the air they breathe reeks of oil and gas and other pollutants; they complain of breathing problems, skin lesions and other health problems, but their concern are not taken seriously and they have almost no information on the impacts of pollution.

Cleaning Up the Mess

 

Click image to enlarge

While the priority is to prevent pollution that leads to the violation of human rights, swift and effective clean-up and rehabilitation of pollution and environmental damage, once these have occurred, is critical to the protection of human rights. If pollution and environmental damage persist, then so, frequently does the associated violation of human rights, driving people deeper into poverty through long-term damage to livelihoods and health.

Clean-up of oil pollution in the Niger Delta is frequently both slow and inadequate, leaving people to cope with the ongoing impacts of the pollution on their livelihoods and health. Failure to swiftly contain, clean up and remediate oil spills can increase the danger of fires breaking out and causing damage to life and property. Fires may be started deliberately or accidentally but can be devastating.

Both the government of Nigeria and Shell - the main oil company operating on land in the Niger Delta - have a responsibility to clean up oil operations and come clean about the human impact of the oil industry in the Niger Delta.

Read more: Amnesty International, "Petroleum, Pollution and Poverty in the Niger Delta," Report

For technical details relating to the geospatial analysis presented on this site, visit the website of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

---

¹Report of the Niger Delta Technical Committee, November 2008, p102. Figure is based on the 2006 census. ²G. Wurthmann, "Ways of Using the African Oil Boom for Sustainable Development", African Development Bank, Economic Research Working Paper Series, No. 84, March 2006. ³UNDP, Niger Delta Human Development Report, 2006. ⁴UNDP, Niger Delta Human Development Report, 2006. ⁵United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Niger Delta Human Development Report, 2006, p74. ⁶Nigerian Conservation Foundation, WWF UK and International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Commission on Environmental, Economic and Social Policy, with Federal Ministry of Environment (Abuja), "Niger Delta Natural Resources Damage Assessment and Restoration Project Scoping Report", May 2006.⁷Amnesty International, "Nigeria: Petroleum, Pollution and Poverty in the Niger Delta", (2009) p27. ⁸A 1995 World Bank report noted: "Lumps from oil spillage can be directly observed and oil films cover the water surface. Spills of raw materials or leaks during processing can cause serious surface water, soil, and groundwater contamination," World Bank, Defining an Environmental Development Strategy for the Niger Delta, 25 May 1995, Vol II, Industry and Energy Operations Division West Central Africa Department, p35. ⁹Oil experts assert that many pipelines and installations in the Niger Delta have not been adequately maintained, and this is a contributory factor in corrosion and leaks. See: "Double standards? International Best Practice Standards to Prevent and Control Pipeline Oil Spills, Compared with Shell Practices in Nigeria", Professor Richard Steiner, University of Alaska, USA, November 2008. Available at: http://www.milieudefensie.nl/english/shell/the-people-of-nigeria-versus-shell ¹⁰ Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co Solicitors, 3 August 2011. (Martyn Day) ¹¹Environmental Rights Action and The Climate Justice Programme, "Gas Flaring in Nigeria: A human rights, environmental and economic monstrosity", June 2005. In this report the authors quote from British government documents in the 1960s that show awareness of gas flaring as a problem. ¹²The Associated Gas Reinjection Act 1979 required every company to submit a plan on how they would implement the reinjection of associated gas, including a scheme for the utilization of all produced gas (section 2). Under section 3 of the Associated Gas Reinjection Act 1979, a consent to continue flaring can only be issued if the Minister is satisfied that utilization or reinjection is not appropriate or feasible in a particular field or fields. The Associated Gas Reinjection (Continued Flaring of Gas) Regulations 1984 include a range of conditions for continued gas flaring but also allows the Minister to authorize the production of oil from a field that does not satisfy any of the conditions specified in these Regulations. Despite requests by Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria, no consents or conditions have been disclosed by any of the companies. From: www.climatelaw.org. ¹³African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, Decision on communication of The Social and Economic Rights Action Center and the Center for Economic and Social Rights/Nigeria (155/96), para 70. Decision made at the 30th ordinary session of the African Commission of Human and Peoples' Rights, Banjul, 13-27 October 2001, available at http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/africa/comcases/155-96b.html.

Mimiko: Brain Drain Hampering Healthcare DeliveryMimiko: Brain Drain Hampering Healthcare Delivery

ndo State Governor, Dr Olusegun Mimiko on Wednesday blamed brain-drain among medical practitioners as the major factor hampering improved health care delivery in the country.

Ondo State Governor, Dr Olusegun Mimiko

Mimiko spoke in Akure at the opening of the second Annual General Meeting and Scientific Conference of the Medical and Dental Consultants Association of Nigeria, Ondo Government Hospital Chapter.

The governor said the scenario where health workers seek greener pastures outside the country does not augur well for the sustainability of the gains of government's investment in the health sector.

He said it was as a result of the brain drain in health sector that made his government to commence residency programme for post graduate training in some aspects of medicine.

He said the quest to sustain and retain health professionals who may wish to progress in their carrier led to the establishment of the State University of Medical Sciences (UNIMED).ndo State Governor, Dr Olusegun Mimiko on Wednesday blamed brain-drain among medical practitioners as the major factor hampering improved health care delivery in the country.

Predicting which African storms will intensify into hurricanes

Hurricanes require moisture, the rotation of Earth, and warm ocean temperatures to grow from a mere atmospheric disturbance into a tropical storm. But where do these storm cells originate, and exactly what makes an atmospheric disturbance amp up full throttle?

Typhoon, satellite view (stock image).

A new study published in Geophysical Research Letters by Tel Aviv University's Prof. Colin Price and his graduate student Naama Reicher of the Department of Geosciences at TAU's Faculty of Exact Sciences finds most hurricanes over the Atlantic that eventually make landfall in North America actually start as intense thunderstorms in Western Africa.

"85 percent of the most intense hurricanes affecting the U.S. and Canada start off as disturbances in the atmosphere over Western Africa," says Prof. Price. "We found that the larger the area covered by the disturbances, the higher the chance they would develop into hurricanes only one to two weeks later."

Watching the clouds gather

Using data covering 2005-2010, Prof. Price analyzed images of cloud cover taken by geostationary satellites, which orbit Earth at the precise speed of Earth's rotation and take pictures of cloud cover every 15 minutes. This enabled Prof. Price to track the variability in cloud cover blocking Earth's surface in West Africa between the months of June and November -- hurricane season.

The coverage of clouds acts as an indication of atmospheric disturbances. The more clouds in an area, the larger the disturbance. Using infrared cloud-top temperature data gathered from satellites, Prof. Price assessed the temperatures of the cloud tops, which grow colder the higher they rise. He then compared his cloud data with hurricane statistics -- intensity, date of generation, location, and maximum winds --from the same period using the National Hurricane Center data base.

"We first showed that the areal coverage of the cold cloud tops in tropical Africa was a good indicator of the monthly number of atmospheric disturbances -- or waves -- leaving the west coast of tropical Africa," said Prof. Price. "The disturbances that developed into tropical storms had a significantly larger area covered by cold cloud tops compared with non-developing waves."

What makes them special

According to Prof. Price, only 10 percent of the 60 disturbances originating in Africa every year turn into hurricanes. And while there are around 90 hurricanes globally every year, only 10 develop in the Atlantic Ocean.

"We wanted to know what was so special about these 10% of disturbances that develop into hurricanes. Was there something different about these storms at their genesis?" said Prof. Price. "By looking at each of these storms individually, we found again that the larger the cloud coverage originally in West Africa, the higher the value of the accumulated cyclone energy in a future hurricane. The conclusion, then, is that the spatial coverage of thunderstorms in West Africa can foretell the intensity of a hurricane a week later.

"If we can predict a hurricane one or two weeks in advance -- the entire lifespan of a hurricane -- imagine how much better prepared cities and towns can be to meet these phenomena head on," Prof. Price says. He is currently examining the thunderstorm clusters around the eyes of hurricanes to study the intensification process of those destructive phenomena.

Ocean heat content reveals secrets of fish migration behaviors Study uses hurricane forecasting tool to show fishes affinity for ocean fronts and eddies

Researchers at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science developed a new method to estimate fish movements using ocean heat content images, a dataset commonly used in hurricane intensity forecasting. With Atlantic tarpon as the messenger, this is the first study to quantitatively show that large migratory fishes, such as yellowfin and bluefin tunas, blue and white marlin, and sailfish have affinities for ocean fronts and eddies.

This image shows front and eddy utilization in the Gulf of Mexico by pelagic fishes revealed by ocean heat content: (a) a yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares); and, (b) an Atlantic sailfish. OHC maps are based on calculating thermal energy from the depths of the 20°C isotherm.

"Ocean heat content data revealed detailed movements of fishes that were not readily apparent using surface temperature data," said Jerald S. Ault, UM Rosenstiel School professor of marine biology and ecology. "This offers a powerful new approach to study how fish interact with dynamic water features relatively common in the ocean."

Ocean heat content (OHC) relative to the 26°C isotherm, a measure of heat stored in the upper surface layers of the ocean, has been used for more than four decades by scientists to help predict hurricane intensity. Over the past two decades, OHC has been monitored daily using satellite fields and in-situ data that provide basin-scale variability for both weather and climate studies. In addition to providing the OHC for forecasting, these previous studies showed OHC images reveal dynamic ocean features, such as fronts and eddies, in the ocean better than just using standard techniques (e.g., sea surface temperature), especially during the summer months.

The researchers compared data on fish movements obtained from pop-up satellite tags affixed to the highly migratory fish alongside maps of the heat stored in the upper ocean. "Using an advanced optimization algorithm and OHC maps, we developed a method to greatly improve geolocation accuracy and refine fish movement tracks derived from satellite tags," said Jiangang Luo, lead author and UM scientist at the Tarpon and Bonefish Research Center. The analysis revealed that fish commonly swim along the boundaries of water features in the ocean, such as fronts, like the Florida and Loop Current and their complex eddy fields.

"Using the OHC approach in a new way offers an unprecedented view of how these animals move with currents and eddies in the ocean," said Nick Shay, UM Rosenstiel School professor of ocean sciences. "Our study provides a more detailed picture of the ocean ecosystem as an entity."

In one 109-day analysis, the researchers documented a yellowfin tuna move along a weak front off the Mississippi River before reaching an eddy centered in the Gulf of Mexico. In separate analysis, a yellowfin tuna swam around the periphery of the same eddy many times over a 20-day period, rarely passing over it.

Eddies are swirling masses of water that have been shed from strong ocean current fronts, and pump nutrient-rich water to the surface. Fronts are a type of current created at a boundary between two distinct water masses with differing physical properties, such as different temperatures, salinities. In the Gulf of Mexico, warm eddies are often shed from the Loop Current in the summer months causing a rapid intensification of hurricanes (e.g., Katrina) as they pass over it.

"Our new method shows that hurricanes and highly migratory fish share at least one common oceanographic interest -- warm swirling ocean eddies," said Ault

Scientists find link between comet, asteroid showers and mass extinctions

For more than 30 years, scientists have argued about a controversial hypothesis relating to periodic mass extinctions and impact craters -- caused by comet and asteroid showers -- on Earth. Now scientists have concluded that mass extinctions occurring over the past 260 million years were likely caused by comet and asteroid showers.

An artist's illustration of a major asteroid impact on Earth.

Mass extinctions occurring over the past 260 million years were likely caused by comet and asteroid showers, scientists conclude in a new study published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

For more than 30 years, scientists have argued about a controversial hypothesis relating to periodic mass extinctions and impact craters -- caused by comet and asteroid showers -- on Earth.

In their MNRAS paper, Michael Rampino, a New York University geologist, and Ken Caldeira, a scientist in the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology, offer new support linking the age of these craters with recurring mass extinctions of life, including the demise of the dinosaurs. Specifically, they show a cyclical pattern over the studied period, with both impacts and extinction events taking place every 26 million years.

This cycle has been linked to periodic motion of the Sun and planets through the dense mid-plane of our galaxy. Scientists have theorized that gravitational perturbations of the distant Oort comet cloud that surrounds the Sun lead to periodic comet showers in the inner solar system, where some comets strike Earth.

To test their hypothesis, Rampino and Caldeira performed time-series analyses of impacts and extinctions using newly available data offering more accurate age estimates.

"The correlation between the formation of these impacts and extinction events over the past 260 million years is striking and suggests a cause-and-effect relationship," says Rampino.

Specifically, he and Caldeira found that six mass extinctions of life during the studied period correlate with times of enhanced impact cratering on Earth. One of the craters considered in the study is the large (180 km diameter) Chicxulub impact structure in the Yucatan, which dates to about 65 million years ago -- the time of a great mass extinction that included the dinosaurs.

Moreover, they add, five out of the six largest impact craters of the last 260 million years on earth correlate with mass extinction events.

"This cosmic cycle of death and destruction has without a doubt affected the history of life on our planet," Rampino observes.

Formation of coastal sea ice in North Pacific drives ocean circulation, climate

New understanding of changes in North Pacific ocean circulation over the past 1.2 million years could lead to better global climate models

An unprecedented analysis of North Pacific ocean circulation over the past 1.2 million years has found that sea ice formation in coastal regions is a key driver of deep ocean circulation, influencing climate on regional and global scales. Coastal sea ice formation takes place on relatively small scales, however, and is not captured well in global climate models.

The formation of coastal sea ice, seen here in the Arctic Ocean, plays an important role in driving "overturning circulation" in the North Pacific Ocean.

An unprecedented analysis of North Pacific ocean circulation over the past 1.2 million years has found that sea ice formation in coastal regions is a key driver of deep ocean circulation, influencing climate on regional and global scales. Coastal sea ice formation takes place on relatively small scales, however, and is not captured well in global climate models, according to scientists at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who conducted the study.

A paper on the new findings will be published in a future issue of the journalPaleoceanography and is currently available online.

"We have identified an important process that current global climate models don't adequately capture. Coastal sea ice formation may be important to future climate change because the arctic and subarctic regions are warming at twice the rate of other parts of the world," said first author Karla Knudson, a graduate student in Earth and planetary sciences at UC Santa Cruz.

When sea ice forms, it expels salt into the surrounding water, increasing the density of the water and causing it to sink, carrying oxygenated surface water into the depths. One result is a flow of cold deep water toward the equator and warm surface water toward the poles, and this "overturning circulation" plays a crucial role in moving heat around the globe.

"It helps to modulate the climate by transferring heat from the equator to the poles," said coauthor Christina Ravelo, professor of ocean sciences at UC Santa Cruz.

This process (also called "thermohaline circulation") has received less attention in the North Pacific than in the North Atlantic, where the formation of North Atlantic Deep Water is a powerful driver of global ocean circulation and climate. In the North Pacific, overturning circulation driven by formation of the North Pacific Intermediate Water is not as strong as in the North Atlantic, but it plays a major role in the region's climate.

In 2009, when Ravelo led an expedition of the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) to the Bering Sea (with co-chief scientist Kozo Takahashi of Kyushu University, Japan), one of her main goals was to investigate the role of the North Pacific Intermediate Water in climate change. The expedition drilled sediment cores from the floor of the Bering Sea that preserve records of the regional climate and ocean circulation covering the past 1.2 million years, much longer than any other oceanographic records from that region. By analyzing these records, Knudson and Ravelo found that the strength of the overturning circulation in the North Pacific is inherently linked to global climate changes, but not in the way scientists had previously thought.

The sediment cores used in this study cover a period when the planet went through many climate cycles driven by variations in Earth's orbit, from extreme glacial periods such as the Last Glacial Maximum about 20,000 years ago, when massive ice sheets covered the northern parts of Europe and North America, to relatively warm interglacial periods with climates more like today's.

Previous studies based on global climate models indicated that the overturning circulation in the North Pacific and North Atlantic responded in opposite ways to major shifts in global climate. During glacial periods, sea level falls as water gets locked up in the ice sheets, and in extreme cases the Bering Strait connecting the Bering Sea to the Arctic Ocean closes and becomes a land bridge. This shuts off the flow of relatively fresh North Pacific water into the saltier North Atlantic, leading to increased salinity in the North Atlantic and stronger overturning circulation there.

At the same time, the thinking went, a fresher North Pacific would have weaker circulation. This oceanic "seesaw" would result in a cooling effect in one ocean and a warming effect in the other. But that's not what the sediment cores revealed. "We found that the overturning circulation actually strengthens in both oceans when the Bering Strait is closed," Knudson said.

What the climate models were missing, she said, was the strong brine production from sea ice formation in the Bering Sea. The global climate models do a good job of simulating the process of sea ice formation over large areas in the open ocean. But the critical coastal process, which actually generates more of the deep water, occurs on smaller scales and is only captured in high-resolution regional climate models, Knudson said.

The Bering Sea is less important during warm periods like today, when wintertime sea ice formation in the Sea of Okhotsk generates most of the North Pacific Intermediate Water. But the same process of sea ice formation and brine production along coastal shelves plays a critical role wherever it occurs.

"These small-scale processes might be important to understanding the full impact of climate change," Ravelo said. "As the climate gets warmer, we could see reduced sea ice formation in the Sea of Okhotsk and the Arctic. So it would be nice for the climate models to have sufficient resolution to be able to predict the impact of changes in coastal sea ice."

Knudson and Ravelo based their findings on an analysis of carbon and oxygen isotopes in the calcium carbonate shells of tiny marine organisms called foraminifera, which are preserved in seafloor sediments. Chemical signatures of the ocean water the organisms lived in are locked into the composition of their shells, and researchers can analyze them for evidence of past water temperatures and other oceanographic conditions.