Honeybees Face Global Threat: If They Die, So Do We

“There is one masterpiece, the hexagonal cell, that touches perfection. No living creature, not even man, has achieved, in the centre of his sphere, what the bee has achieved in her own: and were some one from another world to descend and ask of the earth the most perfect creation of the logic of life, […]

An Unprecedented Future

I can see The Age of Consequences from my home. We live on a former ranch near Santa Fe, New Mexico, that is now a subdivision with more than two thousand houses. Due to its proximity to a center of colonial Spanish, Mexican, and American administrations, as well as the Santa Fe Trail, the land […]

Have We Reached A “Peak Water” Tipping Point In California?

It may be a see-saw course, but it’s riding an uphill train. A bit ago I wrote, regarding climate and tipping points: The concept of “tipping point” — a change beyond which there’s no turning back — comes up a lot in climate discussions. An obvious tipping point involves polar ice. If the earth keeps […]

‘Peak Water’ After ‘Peak Oil’ Fails

Twenty years ago, the volatile Persian Gulf supplied 35 percent of U.S. oil consumption and the left’s so-called experts were screaming that the world had hit the “peak oil” extraction point, after which supply would soon dwindle rapidly. The left demanded a radical reduction in capitalist economic activity to save what precious energy resources remained […]

There Are Half as Many Fish as There Were in 1970

Mankind’s insatiable appetite for seafood has decimated global fisheries. A disturbing new report from the World Wildlife Fund and the Zoological Society of London reveals that the number of fish and other aquatic animals dropped 49 percent between 1970 and 2012. And some fish populations have been hit even harder: tunas, mackerels, and bonitos have […]

Human Overpopulation

In the 21st century, humanity’s prolific ability toward exponential procreation guarantees human misery, suffering, starvation and environmental destruction on a level unknown in the past 10 centuries. At 7.3 billion people in 2015, and adding 1 billion every 12 years–the human race expects to add 3.1 billion within 35 years to reach between 10.1 billion […]

No limits to growth

In 1968 Stanford biologist Paul R. Ehrlich burst into American popular consciousness with his best-selling book, The Population Bomb. Like many doomsayers before him, he argued that in a world of finite resources, the biggest slices of pie get cut at the least-crowded table and that a reduced population would leave each individual a greater […]

Brazil pledges to slash emissions by 43%

Brazil pledged on Sunday to slash greenhouse gas emissions by 43 percent by 2030 as its contribution to a United Nations climate agreement, but said it will include reductions from past efforts against deforestation to help it reach the target. President Dilma Rousseff presented the country’s pledges during a speech at the U.N. General Assembly in […]

Fukushima reactor could have suffered total meltdown

Fukushima’s reactor No.2 could have suffered a complete meltdown according to Japanese researchers. They have been monitoring the Daiichi nuclear power plant since April, but say they have found few signs of nuclear fuel at the reactor’s core. TrendsFukushima nuclear disaster The scientists from Nagoya University had been using a device that uses elementary particles, […]

What if oil spewed into Great Lakes?

Canadian oil transport giant Enbridge, the U.S. Coast Guard and several other federal, state and local agencies took to the waters of the Great Lakes Thursday in boats big and small, testing their preparedness and capabilities to contain what many consider as the worst of nightmare scenarios for the Great Lakes: a leak in Enbridge’s […]

Decades-Long “Megadrought” Looms For Entire US As Lake Powell Runs Dry, NASA Warns

With the number of people living in the U.S. Southwest and Central Plains, and the volume of water they need, having increased rapidly over recent decades – and, with NASA scientists expecting these trends to continue for years to come – the current severe drought combined with the tapping of the Lake Powell’s water at […]

India Approaches Replacement Fertility

This Population Bulletin updates a previous Bulletin from 2006, India’s Population Reality: Reconciling Change and Tradition. Indias’s population (currently at 1.3 billion) will exceed China’s before 2025 to make India the world’s most populous country. India’s annual increase of about 19 million people contributes more to the annual world population growth of about 89 million […]

All The Doomsday Prophecies That Didn’t Come True

Ronald Bailey isn’t surprised by those who regularly renew warnings of environmental Armageddon. The award winning author and Reason journalist says there’s a simple reason for so much gloom: “doom sells.” From Peak Oil to the Population Bomb, Bailey goes through a veritable anthology of debunked environmental doomsday prophecies on today’s episode of Federalist Radio. […]

Californian water source at 500-year low

Snow cover in the Sierra Nevada mountain range, a water lifeline for California’s cities and agriculture, has hit its lowest level in 500 years, a study said Monday. Measured on April 1, the natural, frozen reservoir was barely five percent of the 1950-2000 average, threatening tens of millions of Californians and the state’s $50-billion (44-billion-euro) […]

Fukushima Dumps First Batch of Radioactive Water In Sea

No.1 (L) and No.2 reactor buildings are seen at Kyushu Electric Power’s Sendai nuclear power station in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima prefecture in Japan on July 8, 2015. Kyushu Electric Power Co. started loading uranium fuel rods into a reactor this summer, marking the first attempt to reboot Japan’s nuclear industry in nearly two years after the […]

The Zombie Patrix Apocalypse

““We recapitulate the conditions that create our fears, subconsciously wanting to relieve the original stress, but then we make the same bad choices, because of our conditioning, and so it goes, we have to do it again.”” 161: the number of countries in which environmental disasters, most of them due to weather-related events, have caused […]

Malthusian nightmare

The 19th century started with unlimited optimism in the power of scientific revolution to solve mankind’s vulnerability on all fronts. Man seemed to be at the threshold of fulfilling God’s command to use nature for a better world for all. In this milieu the English cleric and scholar, Thomas Robert Malthus (1766 – 1834), stunned […]

How to Stop Climate Change

This week we re-think our critique of the People’s Climate March, then we go to Germany where trouble makers have been regularly shutting down Europe’s largest source of CO2. Then on to Greece, to look at a growing resistance against a gold mine and finally to the longest running blockade of oil and gas pipelines […]

Record Fukushima radiation levels found on southern California coast

Record radiation levels from the Fukushima power plant were found off the coast of Southern California. Radioactive cesium was measured  on a beach between San Diego and Los Angelos. The nuclear waste was detected in early April 2015, meaning toxic levels of radiation have been plaguing the West Coast since early spring. Approximately 8.4 becquerels […]

The Anthropocene and Ozymandias

Much has been made lately of the so-called Anthropocene — the idea that Homo sapiens has so taken over and modified Earth that we need a new name for our geological age instead of the outmoded Holocene. One remorseless Anthropoceniac writes, ‘Nature is gone… You are living on a used planet. If this bothers you, […]

The Extinction of Humanity

As the temperatures swelter in the once-crisply cool climates of the world and water levels rise to mercifully meet our sun-burnt feet in violent wave after wave, we still do nothing. Nothing significant enough is being done, or is even being discussed, to adequately combat this new global crisis that we not only face but […]

Economic Growth in Asia Threatens Environment

Strong economic growth in Asia has lifted millions of people out of poor economic conditions. But some environmental activists say it has also hurt the area’s environment. The International Union for Conservation of Nature met in Bangkok, Thailand recently for three days. The group urged Asian countries to work together to protect the environment. It […]

Earth Overshoot: Running on Empty

  According to data from the Global Footprint Network, August 13, 2015 was officially “Earth Overshoot Day.” We have now used nature’s entire budget for the year. Global Footprint Monitor tracks humanity’s demand on natural resources against nature’s ability to accommodate that demand – also known as biocapacity. Carbon sequestration, natural carbon sinks for increasing […]

Population and climate instability will lead to severe food shortages by 2050

The food industry has become much more efficient in the last few decades as a result of globalization, but also a lot more vulnerable to shocks. Climate change will lead not only to increased temperatures, but the extreme weather it causes in North, South America and Asia are likely to also lead to global food […]

Austerity and Degrowth – Dealing with the Economic Crisis and the Ecological Crisis Together

This article arises from increasing frustration and irritation about the way that the debate about Greece, and in general about austerity, is framed. My frustration is not only with the policy thugs who are implementing austerity, but also, to a degree, with their critics – which includes the failure of most of the critics of […]

World Population Will Nearly Double by 2100

The world population is 7.3 billion presently. It will surpass 11 billion by the end of the century, according to UN Population Division projections The world population is growing at an unprecedented rate. It will nearly double as much as we have today by 2100. Currently, the world population is 7.3 billion. It will be […]

The Earth’s Battery Is Running Low

In the quiet of summer, a couple of U.S. scientists argued in the pages of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that modern civilization has drained the Earth — an ancient battery of stored chemical energy — to a dangerous low. Although the battery metaphor made headlines in leading newspapers in China, India […]

Are we heading for a world of 11 billion people?

The world population is growing at a slower rate than it was 10 years ago – from 1.24% a decade ago to 1.18% today – according to the United Nations’ latest projections. But that still means we’re adding an extra 83 million people annually. If the projections are accurate, the world population will reach 9.7 […]

Peak oil is dead – long live clean air

Achieving a decarbonised economy is not only possible, it’s vital to escape the worst effects of climate change. Oil surely now has one foot in the grave. Collectively, governments currently spend around US$1t a year subsidising fossil fuels, but the irony is that if they do as they say, and limit climate change to below […]

Getting It Right on Population

There was a time when we worried about a “population explosion,” with ever more people fighting over ever fewer resources. Yet, the population growth has decreased since the late 1960s and resources have not run out. There are still population problems, but the two main ones are likely different from what you think. The UN […]

« Previous Page — Next Page »

LATEST NEWS HEADLINES

• Why the IEA is Wrong About Peak Oil Demand
• Did we inadvertently speed global warming?  
• Venezuela’s Oil Monopoly Eases
• Why Germany is Choosing Natural Gas Over Nuclear Power
• U.S. coal-fired electricity generation decreased in 2022 and 2023

• America Cracks Down on Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas Facilities
• Meet America’s Newest Oil Trader Extraordinaire: Joe Biden
• Is It Time To Refill America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve?
• Oil prices set to end year 10% lower as demand concerns snap winning streak
• What’s Driving America’s New Oil and Gas Boom?
• China’s peak oil demand bombshell eviscerates Danielle Smith’s energy strategy