November 23, 2009 by osmobuddy
In the last three years alone, more than 9,400 of the nation’s 25,000 sewage systems — including those in major cities — have reported violating the law by dumping untreated or partly treated human waste, chemicals and other hazardous materials into rivers and lakes and elsewhere, according to data from state environmental agencies and the Environmental Protection Agency.But fewer than one in five sewage systems that broke the law were ever fined or otherwise sanctioned by state or federal regulators, the Times analysis shows.
via Sewers at Capacity, Pollution Spills Into Waterways – Series – NYTimes.com.
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November 22, 2009 by osmobuddy
A report released Sunday recorded 17,650 species living below 656 feet, the point where sunlight ceases. The findings were the latest update on a 10-year census of marine life.“Parts of the deep sea that we assumed were homogenous are actually quite complex,” said Robert S. Carney, an oceanographer at Louisiana State University and a lead researcher on the deep seas.Thousands of marine species eke out an existence in the ocean’s pitch-black depths by feeding on the snowlike decaying matter that cascades down — even sunken whale bones. Oil and methane also are an energy source for the bottom-dwellers, the report said.The researchers have found about 5,600 new species on top of the 230,000 known. They hope to add several thousand more by October 2010, when the census will be done.The scientists say they could announce that a million or more species remain unknown. On land, biologists have catalogued about 1.5 million plants and animals.
via 5,600 deep ocean species recorded for the first time « …free your imagination….
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November 17, 2009 by osmobuddy
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November 15, 2009 by osmobuddy
TheWaterChannel: Making waves!
TheWaterChannel brings together insights in today’s water challenges, multimedia expertise, a passion for better water management and better water services for a growing world.
Join the wave and become part of a global movement.
via TheWaterChannel.
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November 14, 2009 by osmobuddy
Sea turtles are sensitive to numerous effects of warming. They feed on reefs, which are dying in hotter, more acidic seas. They lay eggs on beaches that are being inundated by rising seas and more violent storm surges.
More uniquely, their gender is determined not by genes but by the egg’s temperature during development. Small rises in beach temperatures can result in all-female populations, obviously problematic for survival.
“The turtles are very good storytellers about the effect of climate change on coastal habitats,” said Carlos Drews, the regional marine species coordinator for the conservation group W.W.F. “The climate is changing so much faster than before, and these animals depend on so much for temperature.”
If the sand around the eggs hits 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit), the gender balance shifts to females, Mr. Drews said, and at about 32 degrees (89.6 Fahrenheit) they are all female. Above 34 (93), “you get boiled eggs,” he said.
On some nesting beaches, scientists are artificially cooling nests with shade or irrigation and trying to protect broader areas of coastal property from development to ensure that turtles have a place to nest as the seas rise.
via Turtles Are Casualties of Warming in Costa Rica – NYTimes.com.
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November 10, 2009 by osmobuddy
Swarms of soup-can-sized robots will soon plunge into the ocean seeking data on poorly understood phenomena from currents to biology.
With $2.5 million in new funding from the National Science Foundation, researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography will create and deploy fleets of autonomous underwater explorers (AUEs) to explore the depths. Tens or hundreds of pint-sized robots would be deployed along with one the size of a soccer ball, in setups repeated wherever they are needed.
“AUEs will give us information to figure out how small organisms survive, how they move in the ocean, and the physical dynamics they experience as they get around,” said Scripps researcher Peter Franks. “AUEs should improve ocean models and allow us to do a better job of following 'the weather and climate of the ocean,' as well as help us understand things like carbon fluxes.”
Researchers have some pretty good data on the ocean as a whole, but many localized phenomena are not well understood.
By defining localized currents, temperature, salinity, pressure and biological properties, AUEs will offer new and valuable information about a range of ocean phenomena, according to an NSF statement released today. The 'bot swarms will aid in obtaining information needed for developing marine protected areas, determining critical nursery habitats for fish and other animals, tracking harmful algae blooms, and monitoring oil spills.
via Miniature Robots to Swarm the Oceans | LiveScience.
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November 10, 2009 by osmobuddy
I recently co-founded a dairy-free ice cream company. If we sell enough ice cream at our Whole Foods (and other) accounts to stay viable I will donate $250 minus any amount that you donate on this page to charity:water. Currently we are in 25 Whole Foods stores in Northern California.
mycharity: water
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November 10, 2009 by osmobuddy
ABOARD THE ALGUITA, 1,000 miles northeast of Hawaii — In this remote patch of the Pacific Ocean, hundreds of miles from any national boundary, the detritus of human life is collecting in a swirling current so large that it defies precise measurement.
Light bulbs, bottle caps, toothbrushes, Popsicle sticks and tiny pieces of plastic, each the size of a grain of rice, inhabit the Pacific garbage patch, an area of widely dispersed trash that doubles in size every decade and is now believed to be roughly twice the size of Texas. But one research organization estimates that the garbage now actually pervades the Pacific, though most of it is caught in what oceanographers call a gyre like this one — an area of heavy currents and slack winds that keep the trash swirling in a giant whirlpool.
Scientists say the garbage patch is just one of five that may be caught in giant gyres scattered around the world’s oceans. Abandoned fishing gear like buoys, fishing line and nets account for some of the waste, but other items come from land after washing into storm drains and out to sea.
Plastic is the most common refuse in the patch because it is lightweight, durable and an omnipresent, disposable product in both advanced and developing societies. It can float along for hundreds of miles before being caught in a gyre and then, over time, breaking down.
But once it does split into pieces, the fragments look like confetti in the water. Millions, billions, trillions and more of these particles are floating in the world’s trash-filled gyres
via Researchers Explore Growing Ocean Garbage Patches – NYTimes.com.
More:
Ted Danson’s nonprofit group Oceana
Project Kaisei, based in San Francisco, is trying to devise ways to clean up the patch by turning plastic into diesel fuel
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November 9, 2009 by osmobuddy
“Water is ridiculously common, one of the most common molecules in the universe,” said Nicolas Cowan, an astronomer and astrobiologist at the University of Washington in Seattle.
What seems rare is finding water in liquid form. In space, it either vaporizes if it is too hot or freezes if it is too cold .
“The only time you ever find it stable as a liquid is when you get enough atmosphere down to provide enough pressure to keep it liquid,” Cowan explained.
Scientists looking for aliens consider liquid water “the Holy Grail, the thing that people really want to find,” Cowan said. “Water is the main requirement we can see that life on Earth seems to have.” Although life also needs a source of energy of some kind, in many ways, “you don’t have to worry too much about that,” Meyer added, since Earth shows that life can live off many different kinds of energy, from the sun or heat or chemicals.
Read the article here.
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